IV. 1653. BOOK authority. Perhaps he thought the minds of the people were not so well prepared for such an assumption, nor his own partisans so thoroughly reconciled to it, as hereafter they might be. The instrument conferred on him the office of chief magistrate for life, and declared that, on his decease, the election of a successor should be in the council. This took away one of the principal jewels of the crown, and ran counter to what was undoubtedly the darling hope of the general, to establish in his family a new race of kings. It complied therefore with the secret wish of his soul in semblance only, while it denied the substance. Finally the title of protector was fixed on, as being that which in the practice of the English constitution had usually been employed, when from minority or any other cause, the king was prevented from exercising those functions, which in the ordinary course of things were assigned him. His person and disposition described. The person and disposition of Cromwel are well described, yet not without a leaning to panegyric, and a tinge of religious fanaticism, in a letter written by Maidstone, the steward of his houshold, about a year and a half after his decease. "His body was well compact and strong, his stature under six feet (I believe, about two inches), his head so shaped, as you might see in it a storehouse and shop both, of a vast treasury of natural parts. His temper exceeding fiery, as I have I. 1659. known; but the flame of it kept down for the CHAP. most part, or soon allayed, with those moral endowments he had. He was naturally compassionate towards objects in distress, even to an effeminate measure; though God had made him a heart, wherein was left little room for any fear but what was due to himself [God], of which there was a large proportion. A larger soul, I think, hath seldom dwelt in a house of clay, than his was. I do believe, if his story were impartially transmitted, and the unprejudiced world well possessed with it, she would add him to her nine worthies, and make up that number a decemviri. He lived and died in comfortable communion with God, as judicious persons near him well observed. He was that Mordecai, 'that sought the welfare of his people, and spake peace to his seed':' yet were his temptations such, as it appeared frequently that he, that hath grace enough for many men, may have too little for himself; the treasure he had being but in an earthen vessel, and that equally defiled with original sin as any other man's nature ist." tenance. Perhaps the only portrait of Cromwel, that His counpresents to us an image of his mind, is the miniature by Cooper, of which there is a good print in the early copies of Kimber's Life of the Protector, published in 1724. The eye is steady, vigilant, • Book of Esther, Chap. x. Thurloe, Vol. I, p. 766. IV. 1659. BOOK resolute, pregnant with observation. The lips are compressed and firm, yet visibly adapted to convey emotion and feeling. The brow is large, and indicative of a capacious spirit. Authority is in every feature, without assumption, without affectation; and there is a grave and composed air over the whole, that speaks the early religious habits of his mind. There is somewhat in the aspect that impresses awe on the beholder, at the same time that we are unable to assign to ourselves a reason, why we should be afraid. We observe power, but nothing that bespeaks a tendency to the improper use of it. We observe superiority, not imperious, but unalterable and calm. There is no improbability in the supposition, that Milton, in describing the person of our first parent, had that of Cromwel in his recollection. "In his looks divine The image of his glorious Maker shone, His fair, large front, and eye sublime declared Round from his parted forelock manly hung, "Paradise Lost, Book IV. 13. CHAPTER II. POSITION IN WHICH CROMWEL WAS PLACED.- II. 1659. Position in Cromwel was placed. CROMWEL had now attained the situation, to CHAP. which, ever since the battle of Worcester, he had plainly, in the eyes of history, though not consciously to the perceptions of a multitude of his which contemporaries, aspired. Almost every step he had taken during this interval, had been calculated to prepare the way, and smooth the obstacles, towards his assuming that eminence in which he now palpably stood before the people of his native land. He was not however a king. Whatever magic there is in that name, was not imparted to him. The form of government which had vailed for the last five years was not formally taken away, repealed and abolished. The change that took place was irregularly made, and did not stand forward under such an aspect as should plainly declare, This is constituted to last as long, as the variable and uncertain nature of man will allow human institutions to endure. pre But, in some respects, and as far as related to IV. 1653. Extent of his privileges. BOOK the question of present uses, it had an advantage in this. Cromwel may fairly be said to have had all the powers of a king: but he had something more. A king was an officer well known to the British constitution: all our laws had more or less reference to him: as many of our lawyers as were well skilled in their profession, and had the integrity to speak out what they knew, could tell what belonged to him, and could say to him, as God is represented to say to the waves of the sea, "Thus far shall you go, and no further." But the office of a lord protector, such as was now proclaimed, was new, and its limits not so well defined. There was an uncertainty and a mystery in it, that was favourable to incroachment: and this might be, and was, taken advantage of by Cromwel. Though in sober and deliberate speech it was not reasonable to say that the powers of a lord protector of England should exceed those of an English king, yet human beings are so constituted as to be greatly under the influence of words, and that which would have shocked the people of England under the name and on the part of a king, might be less shocking, when connected with a name with which they were not so much familiarised. Sentiments of Cromwel. Cromwel reflected on the powers with which he was invested with peculiar complacency. He said, The people over whom I am called to rule, are lovers of liberty. For that they have fought for the last twelve years. In this respect my sen |