LX.

merly to the royal caufe. The agitators, he said, had ren- CHA P. dered him odious to the army, and had reprefented him as a traitor, who, for the fake of private intereft, was ready to betray the cause of God to the great enemy of piety 1647. and religion. Defperate projects too, he afferted to be fecretly formed, for the murder of the king; and he pretended much to dread left all his authority, and that of the commanding officers, would not be able to restrain these enthusiasts from their bloody purposes w.

INTELLIGENCE being daily brought to the king of menaces thrown out by the agitators; he began to think of retiring from Hampton-Court, and of putting himself in fome place of fatety. The guards were doubled upon him: The promiscuous concourfe of people restrained: A more jealous care exerted in attending his perfon: All, under colour of protecting him from danger; but really with a view of making him uneasy in his present situation. Thefe artifices foon operated the intended effect. Charles, who was naturally apt to be fwayed by counfel, and who had not then accefs to any good counfel, took fuddenly a refolution of withdrawing himself, tho' without any concerted, at leaft, any rational fcheme, for the future difpofal of his perfon. Attended only by Sir John 11th Nov. Berkeley, Ashburnham, and Leg, he privately left Hampton-Court; and his escape was not discovered, till near an hour after; when thofe, who entered his chamber, found on the table fome letters directed to the parliament, to the general, and to the officer, who had attended him . All night, he travelled thro' the foreft, and arrived next day at Tichfield, a feat of the earl of Southampton, where the countess dowager refided, a woman of honour, to whom, . the king knew, he might fafely entrust his perfon. Before he arrived at this place, he had gone to the fea-coast; and expreffed great anxiety, that a fhip, which he seemed to lock for, had not arrived; and from thence, Berkeley and Leg, who were not in the fecret, conjectured, that his intention was to transport himself beyond fea.

THE king could not hope to remain long concealed at King flies Tichfield: What measure should next be embraced, was to the ile the question. In the neighbourhood lay the isle of Wight, of Wight. of which Hammond was governor. This man was en

tirely

w Clarendon, vol. v. p. 76.

x Rush. vol. viii. p. 871

1647.

CHAP. tírely dependent on Cromwel. At his recommendation LX. he had married a daughter of the famous Hampden, who, during his life-time, had beep an intimate friend of Cromwel, and whofe memory was ever religiously respected by him. These cicumstances were very unfavourable; Yet, because the governor was nephew to Dr. Hammond, the king's favourite chaplain, and had acquired a good character in the army, it was thought proper to have recourfe to him, in the prefent exigence, when no other rational expedient could be thought of. Afhburnham and Berkeley were dispatched to the island. They had orders not to inform Hammond of the place where the king lay concealed, till they had first obtained a promile of him not to deliver up his Majesty, tho' the parliament and army thould require him; but restore him to his liberty, if he could not protect him. This promife, it is evident, would have been a very flender fecurity: Yet even without exacting it, Afhburnham, imprudently, if not treacherously, brought Hammond to Tichfield; and the king was obliged to put himself into his hands, and to attend him to Carifbrokecaftle in the isle of Wight, where, tho' received with great demonstrations of refpect and duty, he was in reality a pri foner.

LORD CLARENDON Y is pofitive, that the king, when the fled from Hampton-court, had no intention of going to this island; and indeed, all the circumstances of that hiftorian's narrative, which we have here followed, strongly favour this opinion. But there remains a letter of Charles's to the earl of Laneric, fecretary of Scotland; in which he plainly intimates, that that measure was voluntarily embraced, and even infinuates, that, if he had thought proper, he might have been in Jersey or any other place of fafety 2. Perhaps, he ftill confided in the promifes of the generals; and flattered himself, that, if he were removed from the fury of the agitators, by which his life was immediately threatened, they would execute what they had fo often promised in his favour.

WHATEVER may be the truth in this matter; for it is impoffible fully to ascertain the truth; Charles was never guilty of a weaker step, nor one more agreeable to Crom wel and all his enemies. He was now lodged in a place, removed from his partizans, at the difpofal of the army, whence

Y P. 79, 80, &c.

Z See note at the end of the volume.

1647.

whence it would be difficult to deliver him, either by force CHA P. or artifice. And tho, it was always in the power of Crom- · LX. wel, whenever he pleased, to have fent him thither; yet. fuch a measure would have been very invidious, if not attended with fome danger. That the king should voluntarily throw himself into the fnare, and thereby gratify his implacable perfecutors, was to them an incident peculiarly fortunate, and proved in the iffue very fatal to him.

CROMWEL, being now entirely master of the parliament, and free from all anxiety, with regard to the cuftody of the king's perfon, applied himself feriously to quell those diforders in the army, which he himself had fo artfully raised, and fo fuccessfully employed, against both king and parliament. In order to engage the troops into a rebellion against their mafters, he had encouraged an arrogant pirit among the inferior officers and private men; and the camp, in many refpects, carried more the appearance of civil liberty than of military obe. dience. The troops themselves were formed into kind of republic, and the plans of imaginary republics, for the fettlement of the ftate, were, every day, the topics of converfation among thefe armed legiflators. Royalty it was agreed to abolish: Nobility must be fet afide: Even all ranks of men be levelled; and an univerfal equality of property, as well as of power, be introduced among the citizens. The faints, they faid, were the falt of the earth: An entire parity had place among the elect; And, by the fame rule that the apostles were exalted from the moft ignoble profeflions, the meaneft fentinel, if enlightened by the fpirit, was entitled to equal regard with the greateft commander. In order to wean the foldiers from, thefe licentious maxims, Cromwel had iffued orders for difcontinuing the meetings of the agitators; and he pretended to pay entire obedience to the parliament, whom, being now reduced fully to fubjection, he propofed to make for the future, the inftruments of his authority. But the Levellers, for fo that party in the army was called, having experienced the fweets of dominion, would not fo easily be deprived of it. They fecretly continued their meetings: They afferted, that their officers, as much as any part of the church or ftate, ftood in need of reformation: Several regiments joined in feditious remonftrances and petitions: Separate

A Rufh. vol. viii. p. 845, 859.

CHAP. Separate rendevoufes were concerted: And every thing LX. tended to a total anarchy and confufion. But this diftemper was foon cured by the rough, but dexterous hand of 1647. Cromwel. "He chofe the occafion of a review, that he might difplay. the greater boldness, and fpread the terror the wider. He seized the ringleaders before their companions: Held in the field a council of war: Shot one mutineer inftantly: And struck fuch dread into the rest, that they presently threw down the fymbols of fedition, which they had displayed, and thenceforth returned to their wonted difcipline and obedience ®.

CROMWEL had great deference for the counfels of Ireton; a man, who, having grafted the foldier on the lawyer, the statesman on the faint, had adopted fuch principles as were fitted to introduce the fevereft tyranny, while they feemed to encourage the most unbounded licence, in human fociety. Fierce in his nature, tho' probably fincere in his intentions; he propofed by arbitrary power to establish liberty, and, in profecution of his imagined religious purposes, he thought himself difpenfed from all the ordinary rules of morality, by which inferior mortals must allow themselves to be governed. From his fuggeftion, Cromwel fecretly called at Windfor a council of the chief officers, in order to deliberate concerning the fettlement of the nation, and the future difpofal of the king's perfon C. In this conference, which commenced with deyout prayers, poured forth by Cromwel himself and other infpired perfons (for the officers of this army received inspiration with their commiffion,) was first opened the daring and unheard of counsel, of bringing the king to justice, and of punishing, by a judicial fentence, their fovereign, for his pretended tyranny and mal-adminiftration. While Charles lived, even tho' restrained to the closest prifon, confpiracies, they knew, and infurrections would never be wanting, in favour of a prince, who was fo extremely revered and beloved by his own party, and whom the nation in general began to regard with great affection and compaf-. fion. To murder him privately was expofed to the imputation of injuftice and cruelty, aggravated by the basenefs of fuch a crime; and every odious epithet of Traitor.. and Affaffin would, by the general voice of mankind, be indifputably afcribed to the actors in fuch a villainy. Some unexpected

.

Rufh. vol. viii. p. 875. Clarendon, vol. v. p. 87. cib. vol. v. P. 92.

unexpected procedure must be attempted, which would CHA P. aftonith the world by its novelty, would bear the fem- LX. blance of justice, and would cover its barbarity by the audacioufnefs of the enterprize. Striking-in with the fana- 1647tical notions of the entire equality of mankind, it would enfure the devoted obedience of the army, and ferve as a general engagement against the royal family, whom, by their open and united deed, they would fo heinoufly affront and injure D.

THIS measure, therefore, being fecretly refolved on, it was requifite, by degrees, to make the parliament adopt it, and to conduct them from violence to violence, till this last act of atrocious iniquity fhould feem, in a manner, wholly inevitable. The king, in order to remove those fears and jealoufies, which were perpetually pleaded as reafons for every invafion of the conftitution, had offered, by a meffage, fent from Carifbroke-castle, to refign, during his own life, the power of the militia and the nomination to all the great offices; provided, that, after his death, these prerogatives fhould revert to the crown But the parliament acted entirely as victors and enemies; and, in all their tranfactions with him, paid no longer any regard to equity or reafon. At the inftigation of the independents and army, they neglected this offer, and framed four propofitions, which they fent him as prelimi naries; and before they would deign to treat, they demanded his pofitive affent to all of them. By one, he was required to invest the parliament with the military power for twenty years, together with an authority to levy whatever money fhould be neceffary for exercifing it: And even after the twenty years fhould be elapfed, they referved a right of re-affuming the fame authority, whenever they fhould declare the fafety of the kingdom to require it. By the fecond, he was to recal all his proclamations and declarations against the parliament, and acknowledge

46

D.The following was a very favourite text among the enthufiafts of that age: 66 Let the high praises of God be in "the mouths of his faints, and a twofold sword in their hands, to execute vengeance upon the heathen and pu"nishment upon the people; to bind their kings with "chains and their nobles with fetters of iron; to execute "upon them the judgments written: This honour have all "his faints." Pfalm cxlix. ver. 6, 7, 8, 9. Hugh Peters, the mad chaplain of Cromwel, preached frequently upon this text: E Ruth. vol. viii. p. 880.