defection of three nations could not have reduced a great king to so ugly a fate, it is most certain that, in that very hour when he was thus wickedly murdered in the sight of the sun, he had as great a share in the hearts and affections of his subjects in general, was as much beloved, esteemed, and longed for by the people in general of the three nations as any of his predecessors had ever been.

To conclude: He was the worthiest gentleman, the best master, the best friend, the best husband, the best father, and the best Christian that the age in which he lived produced. And if he were not the greatest king, if he were without some parts and qualities which have made some kings great and happy, no other prince was ever unhappy who was possessed of half his virtues and endowments, and so much without any kind of vice.

THE CHARACTER OF CROMWELL

He was one of those men whom his very enemies could not condemn without commending him at the same time; for he could never have done half that mischief without great parts of courage, industry, and judgment. He must have had a wonderful understanding in the natures and humors of men, and as great a dexterity in applying them; who, from a private and obscure birth-though of good family-without interest or estate, alliance or friendship, could raise himself to such a height, and compound and knead such opposite and contradictory tempers, humors, and interests into a consistence that contributed to his designs and to their own destruction; whilst himself grew insensibly powerful enough to cut off those by whom he had climbed in the instant that they projected to demolish their own building.

Without doubt no man with more wickedness ever attempted anything, or brought to pass what he desired more wickedly, more in the face and contempt of religion and moral honesty. Yet wickedness as great as his could never have accomplished those designs without the assistance of a great spirit, an admir able circumspection and sagacity, and a most magnanimous resolution.

When he appeared first in the Parliament, he seemed to have a person in no degree gracious, no ornament of discourse, none of those talents which use to conciliate the affections of the

stander-by. Yet as he grew into grace and authority his parts seemed to be raised, as if he had concealed faculties till he had occasion to use them; and when he was to act the part of a great man he did it without any indecency, notwithstanding the want of custom. After he was confirmed Protector, by the humble petition and advice of Parliament, he consulted with very few upon any action of importance, nor communicated any enterprise he resolved upon with more than those who were to have principal parts in the execution of it; nor with them sooner than was absolutely necessary. What he once resolved, in which he was not rash, he would not be dissuaded from, nor endure any contradiction of his power and authority, but extorted obedience from those who were not willing to yield it. . ..

Thus he subdued a spirit that had often been troublesome to the most sovereign power, and made Westminster Hall as obedient and subservient to his commands as any of the rest of his quarters. In all other matters which did not concern the life of his jurisdiction he seemed to have great reverence for the law, rarely interposing between party and party. As he proceeded with this kind of indignation and haughtiness with those who were refractory, and durst contend with his greatness, toward all who complied with his good pleasure and courted his protection he used great civility, generosity, and bounty. To reduce three nations which perfectly hated him to an entire obedience to all his dictates; to awe and govern those nations by an army that was undevoted to him, and wished his ruin, was an instance of very prodigious address. But his greatness at home was but a shadow of the glory he had abroad. It was hard to discover which feared him most, France, Spain, or the Low Countries, where his friendship was current at the value he put upon it. As they did all sacrifice their honor and their interest to his pleasure, so there is nothing he could have demanded that either of them would have denied him. . .

To conclude his character: Cromwell was not so far a man of blood as to follow Machiavel's method; which prescribes upon a total alteration of government, as a thing absolutely necessary, to cut off all the heads of those, and extirpate their families, who are friends to the old one. It was confidently reported that in the council of officers it was more than once proposed "that there might be a general massacre of all the royal party, as the only expedient to secure the government; " but that Cromwell would never consent to: it may be out of too great a con

tempt of his enemies. In a word, as he was guilty of many crimes against which damnation is denounced, and for which hell-fire is prepared, so he had some good qualities which have caused the memory of some men in all ages to be celebrated : and he will be looked on by posterity as a brave, wicked man.

THE CHARACTER OF HAMPDEN.

MR. HAMPDEN was a man of great cunning, and, it may be, of the most discerning spirit, and of the greatest address and insinuation to bring anything to pass which he desired of any man of that time, and who laid the design deepest. He was a gentleman of good extraction and a fair fortune; who from a life of great pleasure and license had, on a sudden, retired to extraordinary sobriety and strictness, and yet retained his usual cheerfulness and affability; which, together with the opinion of his wisdom and justice, and the courage he had showed in opposing the ship-money, raised his reputation to a great height, not only in Buckinghamshire, where he lived, but generally throughout the kingdom.

He was not a man of many words, and rarely began the discourse, or made the first entrance upon any business that was assumed, but a very weighty speaker; and after he heard a full debate and observed how the House was like to be inclined, he took up the argument, and shortly, and clearly, and craftily, so stated it that he commonly conducted it to the conclusion he desired; and if he found that he could not do that he was never without the dexterity to divert the debate to another time, and to prevent the determining any thing in the negative which might prove inconvenient in the future.

He made so great a show of civility, and modesty, and humility, and always of mistrusting his own judgment, and esteeming his with whom he conferred for the present, that he seemed to have no opinions or resolutions but such as he contracted from the information and instruction he received upon the discourses of others, whom he had a wonderful art of governing, and leading into his principles and inclinations, whilst they believed that he wholly depended upon their counsel and advice. No man had a greater power over himself, or was less the man that he seemed to be; which shortly after appeared to everybody, when he cared less to keep on the mask.

THE CHARACTER OF LORD FALKLAND.

IN the unhappy battle of Newbury [September 20, 1643] was slain the Lord Viscount Falkland, a person of such prodigious parts of learning and knowledge, of that inimitable sweetness and delight in conversation, of so flowing and obliging a humanity and goodness to mankind, and of that primitive simplicity and integrity of life, that if there were no other brand upon this odious and accursed civil war than that single loss, it must be most infamous and execrable to all posterity. . .

He had a courage of the most clear and keen temper, and so far from fear that he seemed not without some appetite of danger; and therefore, upon any occasion of action, he always engaged his person in those troops which he thought by the forwardness of the commanders to be most like to be the farthest engaged. And in all such encounters he had about him an extraordinary cheerfulness, without at all affecting the execution that usually attended them; in which he took no delight, but took pains to prevent it where it was not by resistance made necessary: insomuch that at Edgehill (October, 1642), when the enemy was routed, he was likely to have incurred great peril by interposing to save those who had thrown away their arms, and against whom, it may be, others were more fierce for their having thrown them away, so that a man might think he came into the field chiefly out of curiosity to see the face of danger, and charity to prevent the shedding of blood. Yet in his natural inclination he acknowledged he was addicted to the profession of a soldier; and shortly after he came to his fortune, before he was of age, he went into the Low Countries, with a resolution of procuring command, and to give himself up to it; from which he was diverted from the complete inactivity of that summer; so he returned to England, till the first alarm from the north; then again he made ready for the field, and though he had received some repulse in the command of a troop of horse, of which he had a promise, he went a volunteer with the Earl of Essex.

From the entrance into this unnatural war his natural cheerfulness and vivacity grew clouded, and a kind of sadness and dejection of spirits stole upon him which he had never been used to. Yet being one of those who believed that one battle would end all differences, and that there would be so great a victory

on one side that the other would be compelled to submit to any conditions from the victor-which supposition and conclusion generally sunk into the minds of most men, and prevented the looking after many advantages that might then have been laid hold of he resisted these indispositions. But after the King's return from Brentford, and the furious resolution of the two Houses not to admit of any treaty for peace, those indispositions, which had before touched him, grew into a perfect habit of uncheerfulness; and he who had been so exactly easy and affable to all men that his face and countenance was always pleasant and vacant to his company, and held any cloudiness and less pleasantness of the visage a kind of rudeness or incivility, became, on a sudden, less communicable; and thence very sad, pale, and exceedingly affected with the spleen. In his clothes and habit, which he had minded before always with more neatness, and industry, and expense, than is usual to so great a soul, he was now not only incurious, but too negligent; and in his reception of suitors, and the necessary or casual addresses to his place, so quick, and sharp, and severe that there wanted not some men strangers to his nature and disposition. who believed him proud and imperious; from which no mortal man was ever more free.

The truth is, that as he was of a most incomparable gentleness, application, and even a demissness and submission to good and worthy and entire men, so he was naturally (which could not but be more evident in his place which objected him to another conversation and intermixture than his own election had done) adversus malos injucundus [toward evil-doers ungracious] and was so ill a dissembler of his dislike and disinclination to ill men that it was not possible for such not to discern it. There was once in the House of Commons such a declared acceptation of the good service an eminent member had done to them, and as they said, to the whole kingdom, that it was moved, he being present, that the Speaker might in the name of the whole House give him thanks; and then, that every member might as a testimony of his particular acknowledgment stir or move his hat towards him; the which (though not ordered) when very many did, the Lord Falkland (who believed the service itself not to be of that moment, and that an honorable and generous person could not have stooped to it for any recompense), instead of moving his hat, stretched both his arms out and clasped his hands together upon the crown of his hat, and held it close