464 CHAPTER XXVIII. SECOND SESSION OF PARLIAMENT.-ONE HUN- IV. 1657. Second session of parliament. One hun dred excluded members restored. BOOK THE time now approached for the reassembling of parliament; and there were various duties incumbent on the government previously to that occurrence. The petition and advice prescribed two things: first, the restoration of all those members of the representative body, who had been excluded from sitting in parliament otherwise than by the judgment and consent of the house of which they were members; and secondly, the nomination of certain persons, not exceeding seventy in number, nor fewer than forty, who were to constitute the other house in parliament, it having been determined that all parliaments in future should consist of two houses. XXVIII. 1657. Their dis to the go Both these regulations contained in them many CHAP important circumstances. In September 1656 about one hundred members were refused admission into the representative body by the arbi- position trary will of the protector and council; and it unfriendly may well be imagined, that these persons were vernment. presumed to be ill-inclined to the present government, or that they must have been made so by the stigma thus despotically fixed on them. The addition therefore of so large a number of persons to the representative body, who must be supposed to be at least inquisitive and critical as to the newly established order of things, necessarily furnished a subject for much reflection. of the other deliberate As to the question of another house to be or- Institution ganised, there were many advantages that were house. supposed to attend the ancient system of the go- Benefits vernment of this country by two houses of parlia- proposed ment. In the first place, it must be admitted that 1. a more the introduction of any change in the civil or order of criminal laws of England was at least matter of proceeding. grave consideration, and it was therefore conceived that some benefit would arise from the additional degree of deliberation that would inevitably attend the discussion of such change, first by one, and then by another house of legislature. In the next place, the house of lords had always 2. a check been a court of final appeal in many judicial ques- bitrary protions of the highest importance and delicacy; and this resort of appeal had of course been extinguished, by the revolution in the system of our dividuals. to the ar ceedings of mons the com against in IV. 1657. BOOK government, which had taken place upon the death of Charles the First. The house of lords had till that time been admitted as the highest court of judicature; and of consequence the privileges of the two houses had been kept perfectly distinct, as to matters of supposed offence which might come before them. The commons had no jurisdiction but over such breaches of the public peace as interrupted the regularity of their proceedings. They could not administer an oath; they could inflict no privation on any one of their fellow-citizens, except imprisonment; and, as that was supposed to be awarded in their own defence only, and for their security, the prisoner ceased to be held in durance, as soon as the commons ceased to sit. If they had any more serious grievance that came under their consideration, they either referred it for prosecution to the courts below, or brought it under the deliberation and sentence of the lords in the way of impeachment. But all these lines of demarcation had been removed by the abolition of that house. The commons had almost necessarily assumed all the powers which had hitherto been reserved for what was called the upper house: and, in the case of Lilburne, Naylor, and others, had taken upon themselves the infliction of fine, imprisonment, banishment for life, corporal punishment, and the deliberation whether or not the person accused before them should be adjudged to die. XXVIII. 1657. Difficulties the institution of other But the more momentous were supposed to be CHAP. the authorities vested in a house of lords, the more arduous became the task to raise such an edifice from its foundations. Established courts and that attend modes of proceeding, which have been known to our fathers, and our fathers' fathers for many ge- the oth nerations, almost inevitably command, such is the constitution of the human mind, our veneration and deference. But the old house of lords seemed irrevocably to have passed away. The majority of its members had adhered to the king in the great contest between him and the nation; and those who had embraced the popular cause in the commencement, were necessarily displeased and alienated by the manner in which their functions and prerogatives had finally been abolished.. Whatever therefore was to be done in the way of restoring this branch of the constitution, seemed to call for an entirely new construction. It was a formidable idea, that of attempting to create a house of lords. All the prejudices of mankind would be in arms against it. The friend of old institutions would be exasperated; the advocate of popular rights would be inflamed. The members of this house would be assailed on all sides as mushrooms and usurpers. They would be regarded as mere players, personating an importance to which they had no natural claim. Their origin would be investigated; and every thing ignoble that belonged to it, would be studiously IV. 1657. BOOK distorted, and tenfold exaggerated. No person, but with the audacity of Cromwel, could have ventured on the execution of such a project. No person, without his profound knowledge of policy, and his deep insight into the nature of the human mind, would have had the slightest chance to succeed. What the issue of the present experiment would have been we can never know; since, by the death of Cromwel within nine months after it was made, the whole was immediately swept away, and became as if it had never been. Perplexities of Cromwel on the subject. Thurloe, in a letter of the first of December to Henry Cromwel in Ireland, describes in very natural terms the state of the protector's mind on the subject. "His highness has made some progress in the business; but nothing is yet brought to any conclusion. The difficulty proves great, between those who are fit and not willing to serve, and those who are willing and expect it, but are not fit. There are but seven or eight days left for the final resolution, there being a necessity that the writs issue forty days before the parliament meets. By my next I may possibly send you the names; but, I assure you, there is not any one man fully resolved upon as yet. But I beseech your lordship, do not suffer our friends of Ireland, who are of the house of commons, to absent themselves. I hear we shall have a full house, all the members who were kept out resolving to come in; and considering the number of our |