This was accord some dislike thereof yet in civil terms; which being made known to a committee there, she was by them ordered to have her tongue fastened by a nail to the body of a tree by the highway side on a market day. ingly done; and a paper in great letters, setting forth the heinousness of her offence, was fixed to her back to make her the more notorious.1 Another instance of the cruel in tolerance of the Long Parliament is the case of James Naylor, who was condemned by the Parliament to have his tongue bored as a blasphemer.2 Several members were for passing sentence of death upon him. The Protector interested himself in Naylor's favour. "The conduct of the House of Commons," says Mr. Orme, "was as unconstitutional, as its sentence was brutal and unmerited." But there were other cases where the Parliament and Council may appear to have done no more than their situation imperatively demanded in imprisoning and bringing to trial the authors of pamphlets which raised up mutiny in their army and threatened their very existence. On the 27th of March 1649 it was resolved by the House "That the printed paper intituled 'The Second Part of England's New Chains Discovered, &c.,' doth contain much false scandalous and reproachful matter; and it is highly seditious, and destructive to the present Government, as it is now declared and settled by Parliament, tends to division and mutiny in the army, and the raising of a new war in the Commonwealth, and to hinder the present relief of Ireland, and to the continuing of free quarter.” On the same day the Council of State made the following orders: 1 Appendix to Clarendon's State Papers, vol. ii. 2 See Baxter's Autobiography, part i. pp. 102, 103; and Burton's Diary, vol. i. 2 Orme's Life of Baxter, p. 91, note. 4 "5 The First Part of England's New Chains consisted of Lilburne's Objections to the Agreement of the People, as put forth by the Council of War. 5 Commons' Journals Die Martis 27 Martii 1649. "That Sergeant Dendy," who was on the same day appointed "Sergeant-at-Arms to this Council," "be appointed to make proclamation of the order of the House this day against the authors of the book called the New Chains;' and that he do proclaim it in Cheapside, at the new Exchange, in Southwark, and at the Spittle. That the Lord General be desired to give order that Sergeant Dendy may be furnished with a guard drum and trumpets for proclaiming the order of the House against the authors of the book called the New Chains.' That a warrant general be issued for the apprehension of all such as have been publishers of the book called the New Chains.' And that the posts may that night be searched for the said book, and that Mr. Sergeant Dendy do make that search." They also, on the same day, issued a warrant for the apprehension of John Lilburne, Mr. Walwyn, Mr. Overton and Thomas Prince, as being "the authors or publishers of a scandalous and seditious book printed intituled 'The Second Part of England's New Chains Discovered." " 2 On the following day the 28th of March the Council made an order "That Mr. Milton be appointed to make some observations upon the complication of interest which is now amongst the several designers against the peace of the Commonwealth : and that it be made ready to be presented with the papers out of Ireland which the House hath ordered to be printed." On the 28th of March the Council appointed a committee to examine Lt.-Col. John Lilburne and the others concerning the matters contained in the declaration of the Parliament of the 27th of March: and also made an 3 1 Order Book of the Council of State, 27th March, 1649. MS. State Paper Office. 2 Order Book of the Council of State, 27th March, 1649. MS. State Paper Office. 3 Order Book of the Council of State, 28th March, 1649. MS. State Paper Office. order "That Lt.-Col. John Lilburne be committed prisoner to the Tower upon suspicion of high treason for being the author of a scandalous and seditious book intituled 'England's New Chains Discovered.'" 1 2 In order to have some insight into the character of John Lilburne as well as into that "complication of interest' upon which "Mr. Milton" was appointed by the Council of State to make some observations, it will be necessary to go back for a few years to the time when Cromwell first as a captain of a troop and then as a colonel of a regiment of horse beat up his drums for the ardent and energetic souls lodged in strong and active bodies who had long been groaning under a most grievous spiritual as well as civil tyranny. In the beginning of his career one of his officers was James Berry, who had been a clerk of ironworks, and was an old and dear friend of Richard Baxter. When Cromwell lay at Cambridge with "that famous troop which he began his army with," Berry and his other officers proposed, says, Baxter, "to make their troop a gathered church, and they all subscribed an invitation to 3 1 Order Book of the Council of State, 28th March, 1649. MS. State Paper Office. 2 This was the official phrase of that time thus: "That George Lyon, ensign to Capt. Anthony Stampe have a warrant issued out unto him for the beating up of drums for the gathering recruits for the said captain's company, and that Mr. Walley be ordered to ship such men as the said Lyon shall conduct to the waterside to Derry to the rest of his company." -Order Book of the Council of State, 6th July, 1649. MS. State Paper Office. 3 Some modern writers say that Berry had been a gardener, but Baxter, who had known him well, and in whose house he had lived, says that Berry, at the Restoration, was imprisoned in Berry was made Major-General of Wor- me to be their pastor, and sent it to me at Coventry: I sent them a denial." Baxter then says that afterwards meeting Cromwell at Leicester, Cromwell expostulated with him for refusing their proposal; and adds: “These very men that then invited me to be their pastor were the men that afterwards headed much of the army, and some of them were the forwardest in all our changes; which made me wish that I had gone among them, however it had been interpreted, for then all the fire was in one spark.' Baxter heard nothing more of Cromwell and his old friend Berry for about two years. After the battle of Naseby he paid a visit to the army of the Parliament and he then found that Cromwell's chief favourites among the officers held opinions both political and religious which greatly shocked him. "What," they said, "were the lords of England but William the Conqueror's colonels? or the barons but his majors? or the knights but his captains?" They most honoured the Separatists, Anabaptists, and Antinomians; but Cromwell and his Council joined themselves to no party, but were for the liberty of all. Baxter says "2 he perceived that those they did commonly and bitterly speak against were the Scots, and with them all Presbyterians but especially the ministers, and also the committees of the several counties. There were, however, some officers who were still orthodox according to Baxter's 1 Baxter's Autobiography, p. 51. Hobbes says, "The levelling soldiers, finding that instead of dividing the land at home they were to venture their lives in Ireland, flatly denied to go." Behemoth, part iv., p. 266, London, 1682. But Baxter was much better informed on this matter than Hobbes; and we see that, according to Baxter, those who were for dividing the land among them were Cromwell's chief favourites among the officers, and not the men upon whom Cromwell fixed the name of Levellers. At the same time, I do not think that Ireton, Ludlow, Blake, Harrison, are to be reckoned in this class. notion of orthodoxy; and partly from them, partly from the mouths of the leading sectaries themselves, Baxter informed himself of the state of the army. 1 Baxter now blamed himself for having before rejected the invitation to be chaplain to Cromwell's regiment, and after taking two days to deliberate upon the matter accepted an invitation to be chaplain to Whalley's regiment several troops of which had belonged to Cromwell's old regiment.2 Evanson a captain of Whalley's regiment had prevailed over Baxter's reluctance to leave his studies and friends and quiet at Coventry by telling him that their regiment though the most religious, most valiant, most successful of all the army was in as much danger of falling from orthodoxy as any regiment whatsoever; and Whalley the colonel, who like Evanson was according to Baxter orthodox in religion but engaged by kindred and interest to Cromwell, invited him to be chaplain to his regiment. The county committee were so angry with Baxter for proposing to leave them to go to the army that he was fain to tell them all the truth of his motives and design, what a case he perceived the army to be in, and that he was resolved to do his best against it. Whatever difference of opinion there may be as to Baxter's judgment, his statements respecting what he saw and heard may be accepted as generally truthful and even where from a slip of memory inaccurate, not intentionally so. It would appear from what followed Baxter's statement of his case to the committee, that Cromwell and his confidants did not wish just at that time, 1645, to make any public parade of the opinions religious and political, which Baxter imputed 1 Baxter's Autobiography, p. 51. 2 Baxter says (p. 54), "Cromwell, at the battle of Langport, bid Whalley send three of his troops to charge the enemy, and he sent three of the general's regiment to second them, all being of Cromwell's old regiment." |