It is to be observed here however that Baxter is not strictly accurate in describing the persons called Levellers as adhering to the principles of the Agreement of the People, as drawn by Ireton; inasmuch as on the 26th of February, 164, John Lilburne delivered a paper to the House signed by many of the Levellers proposing several alterations in the "Agreement of the People." A summary of these proposals of which some are reasonable and sensible enough while others have about as much that is rational and practicable as the legislation of Jack Cade will be found in Whitelock.1 These men whom it now suited Cromwell and the Parliament to denominate Levellers had been found extremely useful a year or two earlier; and a year or two later it will suit Cromwell to bestow very hard names on his good friends Harry Vane and Harry Martyn and others whom he finds useful at present. It is the old tale so often told of Ambition's march. The friends of yesterday, when their day is done and they are no longer needed, become but "the broken tools that tyrants cast away."

In May, 1649, a mutiny or insurrection was raised. in the army by that portion of the officers and soldiers whose discontent at the treatment which the Agreement of the People met with from the body which now called itself the Parliament of England led them to attempt what was far beyond their power, and who have been denominated Levellers. The chief leader of these men was William Thomson, a captain of horse, according to Whitelock and according also to a better authority than Whitelock, the Order-book of the Council of State.

1 Whitelock, p. 384, Feb. 26, 1648. Lilburne published, a few days after, his address to the Parliament, containing

his objections to the Agreement of the People, under the title of " England's New Chains Discovered."

Baxter speaks of Thomson as one of the corporals of that theological troop of Walley's regiment who disputed with him for a whole day in Agmondesham church. But he may have risen from the rank of corporal to that of captain in the interval of three or four years. According to Whitelock Thomson marched up and down with about 200 horse and "declared to join with those of Colonel Scroope's, Colonel Harrison's, and Major General Skippon's regiments in their Declaration and resolution." According to another contemporary writer whose accuracy however is not much to be relied on, the Levellers of the army drew together to a rendezvous about Banbury, in Oxfordshire, to the number of 4000 or 5000, others resorting to them daily from other parts.' Thomson published a declaration in print, intituled "England's Standard advanced, or a Declaration from Mr. William Thomson, and the oppressed People of this Nation, now under his Conduct in Oxfordshire, dated at their Rendezvous, May 6, 1649." At the end of this document were these words: "Signed by me William Thomson, at our rendezvous in Oxfordshire near Banbury, in behalf of myself and the rest engaged with me, May 6, 1649, for a new Parliament, by the Agreement of the People."

Now as Lilburne's "Agreement of the People" was dated May 1, 1649 and is specially referred to in Thomson's Declaration, it may be concluded that the "new Parliament by the Agreement of the People," demanded by Thomson and those engaged with him was a new Parliament by Lilburne's and not by Ireton's Agreement of the People. This indeed is expressly stated in the Declaration. There were, as I have said, in Lilburne's Agreement of the People, amid some provisions that were

1 Clement Walker's History of Independency, part ii. p. 179, et seq.

unobjectionable others that savoured somewhat of the legislation of Jack Cade. But as the men called Levellers have been usually condemned by writers who have not given themselves the trouble to obtain any accurate knowledge respecting them, it is but justice that they should be judged by their own words and not by the construction put upon those words by their enemies. Their words and deeds are a part of the drama of this troubled period of English history, without a tolerably accurate knowledge of which, the whole meaning of that drama cannot be known. The Declaration thus commences :—

:

Whereas, it is notorious to the whole world, that neither the faith of the Parliament, nor yet the faith of the army formerly made to the people of this nation in behalf of their common right, freedom, and safety, hath been at all observed, or made good, but both absolutely declined and broken, and the people only served with bare words and fair promising papers, and left utterly destitute of all help or delivery and that this hath principally been by the prevalency and treachery of some eminent persons, now domineering over the people, is most evident. The solemn engagement of the army at Newmarket and Triplo-heath by them destroyed, the Council of Agitators dissolved, the blood of war shed in time of peace, petitions for common freedom suppressed by force of arms, and petitioners abused and terrified, the lawful trial by twelve sworn men of the neighbourhood subverted and denied, bloody and tyrannical courts, called a High Court of Justice and a Council of State, erected, the power of the sword advanced and set in the seat of the magistrates, the civil laws stopped and subverted, and the military introduced, even to the hostile seizure, imprisonment, trial, sentence, and execution of death, upon divers of the free

people of this nation, leaving no visible authority, devolving all into a factious Juncto and Council of State, usurping and assuming the name, stamp, and authority of Parliament, to oppress, torment and vex the people, whereby all the lives, liberties and estates, are subdued to the wills of those men, no law, no justice, no right or freedom, no case of grievances, no removal of unjust barbarous taxes, no regard to the cries and groans of the poor to be had, while utter beggary and famine, like a mighty torrent, hath broken in upon us, and already seized upon several parts of the nation." 1

The Declaration then proceeds to state that they are resolved as one man, even to the hazard and expence of their lives and fortunes," which would imply that some of them had property to lose as well as life, "to endeavour the redemption of the magistracy of England, from under the force of the sword, to vindicate the Petition of Right, to set the unjustly imprisoned free, to relieve the poor, and settle this commonwealth, upon the grounds of common right, freedom, and safety." They then, "that all the world may know particularly what they intend,” declare that they "will endeavour the absolute settlement of this distracted nation, upon that form and method by way of an Agreement of the People, tendered as a peace-offering by Lieut.-Col. John Lilburne, Mr. William Walwyn, Mr. Tho. Prince, and Mr. Richard Overton, bearing date, May 1, 1649."

Now if, the question of abstract right apart, there were certain grave practical difficulties in the way of the Parliament's accepting Ireton's Agreement of the People, there would be practical difficulties far greater, to say nothing of difficulties on the ground of sound principle, in the way of

1 This Declaration has been reprinted

Lieut.-Col. John Lilburne, in State

at the end of the report of the trial of Trials, vol. iv. pp. 1410-1413.

their accepting Lilburne's Agreement of the People. Besides, if they acceded to the demand of those who offered them Lilburne's Agreement of the People "with their swords in their hands," the sovereignty passed at once from their hands to the hands of the leaders of this

section of their army. And though the immediate consequence might have been the erection for a short time of a goverment partaking considerably more of the nature of a democracy, or a democratic republic, than the commonwealth of the Rump of the Long Parliament, the ulterior consequence would have been such a political chaos as the substitution of the brains of Lilburne, Overton and Thomson, for the governing power, in the place of the brains of Cromwell, Ireton and Vane, would be likely to produce.

Colonel Reynolds first attacked these men, and afterwards Fairfax and Cromwell surprised them in their quarters at Burford, in Oxfordshire, with a very superior force. A small number escaped. Thomson was pursued and slain, making a brave defence singly to the last, near Wellingborough, in Northamptonshire. The rest, the number of whom is variously stated, were taken prisoners at Burford, and, with one or two exceptions, were pardoned. "So that," to borrow the words of Baxter, "the Levellers' war was crusht in the egg.' On the 12th of May, the Council of State made an order, "that a letter of thanks be written to Colonel Reynolds for his good service done in dispersing the rebellious troops under Captain Thomson. The important part performed by Cromwell in the

1 "Be it therefore known," says the Declaration, "to all the free people of England, and to the whole world, that (choosing rather to die for freedom, than live as slaves), we are gathered and associated together upon the bare account of Englishmen, with our swords in our hands, to redeem ourselves and

2