Prepara-
tions for

Laft
Debate.

Remon ftrance lying on table.

Statement

by Cla

rendon :

charge against Pym:

a mifreprefentation.

"have determined it." To which Falkland made reply that there would not have been time enough, for fure it would take fome further debate. Oliver rejoined, "A very

forry one."*

Cromwell was mistaken, no doubt. He was not in Hyde's confidence, and could not know of the defperate party-move to be attempted on the occafion of the laft debate. But before this is defcribed, and while the Remonstrance, ready engroffed, is lying on the table of the house, the time would feem to have arrived for the endeavour to prefent it to the reader, at once with fufficient fulness for accurate reflection of all its statements and in fuch form as to render juftice to the striking narrative they embody, yet at the fame time fo compreffed as to bring it within the limits of ordinary hiftories. There, it should long ago have had the place, from which it may hardly be too much to believe now, with fome degree of

Hift. ii., 42. Clarendon tells the anecdote, however, in a fenfe quite different from that which it derives from an authentic statement of the circumftances. It was in the ordinary course of the bufinefs of the House that Pym had propofed at once to bring the matter to a conclufion, but Clarendon (ii. 41) would have us believe that he made that propofition in direct forfeiture of a previous engagement. "And by thefe and the like arts, they promised themselves "that they should easily carry it; fo that, the day it was to be "refumed, they entertained the Houfe all the morning with "other debates, and towards noon called for the Remon"ftrance," &c, upon which they were forced to go back to the first understanding of giving an entire day to the debate. Accordingly, he continues, "the next morning, the debate being entered upon about nine of the clock," &c. Now, no fuch incidents occurred. On the day fixed for the refumption of the debate, it was refumed, and at the hour precifely which before had been arranged; namely, twelve o'clock. Clarendon's statement is an entire mifreprefentation.

illuftra

confidence, that it never more can be excluded. In which expectation are here appended to it Proposed fome notes of matters not lying on the furface hiftorical of ordinary books, which will be found to tions. illuftrate and completely corroborate the most ftartling of its averments.

And fo to modern readers is committed that Great Vindication of the rifing of their anceftors against the Sovereign in the feventeenth century, as to which one who oppofed it eloquently through all its ftages thus frankly confeffed the fecret of his oppofition: "Sir, Dering "this Remonftrance, whenfoever it palleth, will on the "make fuch an impreffion, and leave fuch a cha- ftrance. "racter behind, both of his Majefty, the People, "and the Parliament, and of this prefent Church "and State, as no time fhall ever eat it out, "while hiftories are written, and men have eyes "to read them!"

Remon

twelve

1. The Preamble: Purpofe aimed at. THE Preamble, confifting of twenty not Struggle numbered clauses, and opening in the name of of paft "the Commons in the prefent Parliament months. "affembled," begins by declaring that for the past twelve months they had been carrying on a ftruggle of which the object was to refore and establish the ancient honour, greatness, and fecurity, of the Nation and the Crown. That during this time they had been called to wrestle

Why Remonftrance

intro

with dangers and fears, with miseries and calamities, with diftempers and disorders fo various, great, and preffing, that for the time the entire liberty and profperity of the kingdom had been extinguished by them, and the foundations of the throne undermined. And that now, finding great afperfions caft on what had been done, many difficulties raised for duced. the hindrance of what remained to do, and jealoufies everywhere bufily fomented betwixt the King and Parliament, they had thought it good in this manner to declare the root and growth of the defigns by which fo much mifchief had been caufed; the heighth to which thefe had reached before the beginning of the prefent Parliament; the means that had been Neceffary used for extirpating thofe mifchievous defigns; and, together with the progrefs made therein, Reforms. the ways of obftruction by which fuch progrefs had been interrupted, and the steps ftill remaining to be taken as the only course whereby the obftacles at prefent intervening could be finally removed.

to com

pletion of

Court con

Then, in exprefs terms, they ftate the genefpiracy: ral plan or scheme of the authors of those evils, as a confpiracy to fubvert the fundamental laws and principles of government on which alone the religion and juftice of the kingdom can firmly reft; and they denounce the confpirators to fubvert as threefold, (1) the jefuited papifts, (2) the bishops and ill-affected clergy, and (3) fuch counsellors, courtiers, and officers of state, as had preferred their private ends to thofe of his Majesty and the Commonwealth. All three claffes of confpirators, they continued,

Laws:

1

1

antifm:

Parlia

had principles and counfels in common; and these were to keep up continual differences to degrade betwixt the King and People, and to lower Proteftand degrade the Proteftant religion through the fides of those best affected to it. To the end that fo, on the one hand, fetting up the prerogative whenever a question of liberty was mooted, difcrediting the claims and authority of Parliament, and ever pretending to be fiding to dif with the King, they might get to themselves credit the places of greatest trust and power, putting ment. him upon other than the ancient and only legitimate ways of fupply; and, on the other hand, by cherishing to the utmost such views of church doctrine and difcipline as would establish ecclesiastical tyranny, by sowing dif fenfions between the common Proteftants and those whom they called Puritans, and by Upholders including under the name of Puritans all who of right defired to preferve unimpaired the public laws named and liberties and the purity and power of the Puritans. true religion, they might be able ultimately to introduce fuch opinions and ceremonies would neceffarily end in accommodation with Popery. For, of the three elements of the

as

nick

*"It seemed that their work," said Falkland, in one of Falkland his admirable speeches against Laud and his affociates (already against fpoken of, ante, 208), was to try how much of a Papist Laud. might be brought in without Popery; and to deftroy as "much as they could of the Gospel without bringing them"felves into danger of being deftroyed by the Law. "The defign has been to bring in an English though not a "Roman Popery: I mean, not only the outfide and dress of "it, but an equally abfolute and blind dependence of the people upon the clergy, and of the clergy upon themselves. "They have oppofed the papacy beyond the feas that they Proposed might fettle one beyond the water.' [He means at Lam- Pope at beth.] "Nay, common fame is more than ordinarily false, if Lambeth.

confpira

Popery confpiracy, that was the ftrongeft. And as in the chief all compounded bodies, fo in this, the operations had been qualified and governed throughout by the predominating element.

tor.

Claufes 1-6.

Such in fubftance was the preamble to the Great Remonftrance; of which all that followed was in the form of practical proofs and illuftrations. Thefe were contained in two hundred and fix numbered clauses; each clause, as we have seen, having been put separately to the House, and fo voted.

2. First, Second, and Third Parliaments of. Charles.

THE firft fix had relation to the First Parliament of the reign, and to the recovery of ftrength by the Popish party after their dif comfiture by the breach with Spain at the clofe of the reign of James. Two fubfidies had been given by that parliament, yet it was disfolved without the relief of a fingle grievance; Incidents and then followed the difafters of Rochelle, of firft the defertion of the Proteftant party in France,

Parlia

ment.

English

livings and Romish

the difcreditable attempt on Cadiz, the abandonment of the Palatinate and of the Proteftant ftruggle in Germany, the wrongs inflicted on merchants and traders, the preffing and billeting of foldiers * in all parts of the king

none of them have found a way to reconcile the opinions of "Rome to the preferments of England; and to be so abso"lutely, directly, and cordially papifts, that it is all that "fifteen hundred pounds a year can do to keep them from opinions. "confeffing it."

* The intolerable wrong and mifery implied in this grievance will be better understood by reminding the reader of the paffionate speech of Wentworth (afterwards Earl of Strafford)