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 against us,-though they should "compass us like bees," as it is in the 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." [A terrible scene indeed:-but there is something in the Heart of Man, then, greater than any scene," which, in the name of the Highest, can defy any "scene 66 or terror whatsoever? "Yea," answers the Hebrew David; "Yea," answers the German Luther; Yea," the English Cromwell. The Ages responsive to one another; soul hailing soul across the dead Abysses; deep calling unto deep.] "There is a river, the streams whereof shall make glad the City of God. God is in the midst of her: she shall not be moved." [No!] Then he repeats two or three times, "The Lord of Hosts is with us: the God of Jacob is our refuge." [What are the King of Spain, Charles Stuart, Joseph Wagstaff, Chancellor Hyde, and your triple-hatted Chimera at Rome? What is the Devil in General, for that matter, the still very extensive Entity called "Devil," with all the force he can raise ?] I have done. All I have to say is, To pray God that He may bless you with His presence; that He who hath your hearts and mine would show His presence in the midst of us. I desire you will go together, and choose your Speaker.* tains be carried into the midst of the sea; though the waters roar and be troubled; though the mountains shake with the swelling thereof! 'There is a river, the streams whereof shall make glad the City of God, the Holy Place of the Tabernacles of the Most High. God is in the midst of her; she shall not be moved: God shall help her, and that right early. The Heathen raged, the Kingdoms were moved: He uttered His voice, the Earth melted. The Lord of Hosts is with us; the God of Jacob is our refuge. 'Come behold the works of the Lord, what desolations He hath made in the Earth! He maketh wars to cease unto the ends of the Earth; He preaketh the bow, and cutteth the spear in sunder; He burneth the chariot in the fire;-Be still, and know that I am God; I will be exalted among the Heathen, I will be exalted in the Earth! The Lord of Hosts is with us; the God of Jacob is our refuge.' * Burton's Diary, i., Introd., p. clxxix. et seq. (from Additional Ays cough Mss., no. 6125). The latest of the Commentators expresses himself in reference to this Speech in the following singular way: No Royal Speech like this was ever delivered elsewhere in the world! It is, with all its prudence, and it is very prudent, sagacious, courteous, right royal in spirit,—perhaps the most artless transparent piece of Public Speaking this Editor has ever studied. Rude, massive, genuine; like a block of unbeaten gold. A Speech not so fit for Drury Lane, as for Valhalla, and the Sanhedrim of the Gods. The man himself, and the England he presided over, there and then, are to a singular degree visible in it; open to our eyes, to our sympathies. He who would see Oliver, will find more of him here than in most of the historybooks yet written about him. 'On the whole, the cursory modern Englishman cannot be expected to read this Speech :—and yet it is pity; the Speech might do him good, if he understood it. We shall not again hear a Supreme Governor talk in this strain; the dialect of it is very obsolete; much more than the grammar and diction, for ever obsolete,—not to my regret the dialect of it. But the spirit of it is a thing that should never have grown obsolete. The spirit of it will have to revive itself again; and shine out in new dialect and vesture, in infinitely wider compass, wide as God's known Universe now is,—if it please Heaven! Since that spirit went obsolete, and men took to "dallying" with the Highest, to "being bold' with the Highest, and not "bold with men (only Belial, and not "Christ" in any shape, assisting them), we have had but sorry times, in Parliament and out of it. There has not been a Supreme Governor worth the meal upon his periwig, in comparison,—since this spirit fell obsolete. How could there? Belial is a desperately bad sleeping partner in any concern whatever! Cant did not ever yet, that I know of, turn ultimately to a good account, for any man or thing. May the Devil swiftly be compelled to call in large masses of our current stock of Cant, and withdraw it from circulation! Let the people "run for gold," as the Chartists say; demand Veracity, Performance, instead of mealy-mouthed Speak. ing; and force him to recal his Cant. Thank Heaven, stern Destiny, merciful were it even to death, does now compel them verily to "run for gold:" Cant in all directions is swiftly ebbing into Bank it was issued by.' Speech being ended, the Honorable Members' went to the House,' says Bulstrode ;* and in the Lobby, with considerable crowding I think, 'received, from the Chancery Clerk, Certifi cates in this form,'-for instance: 'COUNTY OF BUCKS. These are to certify that' Sir Bulstrode Whitlocke is returned by Indenture one of the Knights to serve in this present Parliament for the said County, and approved by his Highness's Council. NATH. TAYLER, Clerk of the Commonwealth in Chancery.' Mr. Tayler has received Four-hundred 'Indentures' from Honorable Gentlemen; but he does not give out Four-hundred 'Certificates,' he only gives Three-hundred and odd. Near Onehundred Honorable Gentlemen can get no Certificate from Mr. Tayler,-none provided for you ;-and without Certificate there is no admittance. Soldiers stand ranked at the door; no man enters without his Certificate! Astonishing to see. Haselrig, Scott and the stiff Republicans, Ashley Cooper and the turbulent persons, who might have leavened this Parliament into strange fermentation, cannot, it appears, get in! No admittance here: saw Honorable Gentlemen ever the like ? A The most flagrant violation of the Privileges of Parliament that was ever known! exclaim they. A sore blow to Privilege indeed. With which the Honorable House, shorn of certain limbs in this ude way, knows not well what to do. The Clerk of the Commonwealth, being summoned, answers what he can ; Nathaniel Fiennes, for the Council of State, answers what he can the Hon orable House, actually intent on Settling the Nation, has to reflect that in real truth this will be a great furtherance thereto; that matters do stand in an anomalous posture at present; that the Nation should and must be settled. The Honorable House, with an effort, swallows this injury; directs the petitioning Excluded Members 'to apply to the Council.'t The Excluded Members, or some one Excluded Member, redacts an indignant Protest, • Whitlocke, p. 639. † Commons Journals, vii., 424, 5, 6 (Sept., 18–22). with all the names appended ;* prints it, privately circulates it, in boxes sent by carriers, a thousand copies in a box:'—and there it rests; his Highness saying nothing to it; the Honorable House and the Nation saying nothing. In this Parliament, different from the last, we trace a real desire for Settlement. As the power of the Major-Generals, in about two months hence,' or three months hence, was, on hint of his Highness him. self, to the joy of Constitutional England, withdrawn, we may here close Part Ninth. Note first, however, as contemporary with this event, the glorious news we have from Blake and Montague at sea; who, in good hour, have at last got hold of a Spanish Fleet, and in a tragic manner burnt it, and taken endless silver therein. News of the fact comes in the beginning of October : in the beginning of November comes, as it were, the fact itself,some Eight-and-thirty wagonloads of real silver; triumphantly jingling up from Portsmouth, across London pavements to the Tower, to be coined into current English money there. The Antichrist King of Spain has lost Lima by an earthquake, and infinite silver there also. Heaven's vengeance seems awakening 'Never,' say the old Newspapers,§'never was there a more terrible visible Hand of God in judgment upon any People, since the time of Sodom and Gomorrah! Great is the Lord; marvellous are His doings, and to be had in reverence of all the Nations. England holds universal Thanksgiving Day; sees Eight-andthirty wagonloads of silver, sees hope of Settlement, sees MajorGenerals abolished; and piously blesses Heaven. * Copy of it and them in Whitlocke, p. 641-3; see also Thurloe, v., 456 490. † Kimber, p. 211. The real date and circumstances may be seen in Burton's Diary, i., 310 (7 Jan., 1656-7), Commons Journals, vii., 483 (29 Jan.); compared with Ludlow, ii., 581, 2. See Godwin, iv., 328. Captain Stayner's Letter (9 Sept., 1656, Thurloe, v., 399); Genera Montague's Letter (Ib., p. 433); Whitlocke, p. 643; &c. § 6 October (in Cromwelliana, p. 160). |