The History of England, from the Accession of James the Second - Volume 1 by Thomas Babington Macaulay (diy ebook reader .txt) π
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which he had learned in the war of the Palatinate did not save
him from the disgrace of being surprised and baffled by such a
Captain as Rupert, who could claim no higher fame than that of an
enterprising partisan.
Nor were the officers who held the chief commissions under Essex
qualified to supply what was wanting in him. For this, indeed,
the Houses are scarcely to be blamed. In a country which had not,
within the memory of the oldest person living, made war on a
great scale by land, generals of tried skill and valour were not
to be found. It was necessary, therefore, in the first instance,
to trust untried men; and the preference was naturally given to
men distinguished either by their station, or by the abilities
which they had displayed in Parliament. In scarcely a single
instance, however, was the selection fortunate. Neither the
grandees nor the orators proved good soldiers. The Earl of
Stamford, one of the greatest nobles of England, was routed by
the Royalists at Stratton. Nathaniel Fiennes, inferior to none of
his contemporaries in talents for civil business, disgraced
himself by the pusillanimous surrender of Bristol. Indeed, of all
the statesmen who at this juncture accepted high military
commands, Hampden alone appears to have carried into the camp the
capacity and strength of mind which had made him eminent in
politics.
When the war had lasted a year, the advantage was decidedly with
the Royalists. They were victorious, both in the western and in
the northern counties. They had wrested Bristol, the second city
in the kingdom, from the Parliament. They had won several
battles, and had not sustained a single serious or ignominious
defeat. Among the Roundheads adversity had begun to produce
dissension and discontent. The Parliament was kept in alarm,
sometimes by plots, and sometimes by riots. It was thought
necessary to fortify London against the royal army, and to hang
some disaffected citizens at their own doors. Several of the most
distinguished peers who had hitherto remained at Westminster fled
to the court at Oxford; nor can it be doubted that, if the
operations of the Cavaliers had, at this season, been directed by
a sagacious and powerful mind, Charles would soon have marched in
triumph to Whitehall.
But the King suffered the auspicious moment to pass away; and it
never returned. In August 1643 he sate down before the city of
Gloucester. That city was defended by the inhabitants and by the
garrison, with a determination such as had not, since the
commencement of the war, been shown by the adherents of the
Parliament. The emulation of London was excited. The trainbands
of the City volunteered to march wherever their services might be
required. A great force was speedily collected, and began to move
westward. The siege of Gloucester was raised: the Royalists in
every part of the kingdom were disheartened: the spirit of the
parliamentary party revived: and the apostate Lords, who had
lately fled from Westminster to Oxford, hastened back from Oxford
to Westminster.
And now a new and alarming class of symptoms began to appear in
the distempered body politic. There had been, from the first, in
the parliamentary party, some men whose minds were set on objects
from which the majority of that party would have shrunk with
horror. These men were, in religion, Independents. They conceived
that every Christian congregation had, under Christ, supreme
jurisdiction in things spiritual; that appeals to provincial and
national synods were scarcely less unscriptural than appeals to
the Court of Arches, or to the Vatican; and that Popery, Prelacy,
and Presbyterianism were merely three forms of one great
apostasy. In politics, the Independents were, to use the phrase
of their time, root and branch men, or, to use the kindred phrase
of our own time, radicals. Not content with limiting the power of
the monarch, they were desirous to erect a commonwealth on the
ruins of the old English polity. At first they had been
inconsiderable, both in numbers and in weight; but before the war
had lasted two years they became, not indeed the largest, but the
most powerful faction in the country. Some of the old
parliamentary leaders had been removed by death; and others had
forfeited the public confidence. Pym had been borne, with
princely honours, to a grave among the Plantagenets. Hampden had
fallen, as became him, while vainly endeavouring, by his heroic
example, to inspire his followers with courage to face the fiery
cavalry of Rupert. Bedford had been untrue to the cause.
Northumberland was known to be lukewarm. Essex and his
lieutenants had shown little vigour and ability in the conduct of
military operations. At such a conjuncture it was that the
Independent party, ardent, resolute, and uncompromising, began to
raise its head, both in the camp and in the House of Commons.
The soul of that party was Oliver Cromwell. Bred to peaceful
occupations, he had, at more than forty years of age, accepted a
commission in the parliamentary army. No sooner had he become a
soldier than he discerned, with the keen glance of genius, what
Essex, and men like Essex, with all their experience, were unable
to perceive. He saw precisely where the strength of the Royalists
lay, and by what means alone that strength could be overpowered.
He saw that it was necessary to reconstruct the army of the
Parliament. He saw also that there were abundant and excellent
materials for the purpose, materials less showy, indeed, but more
solid, than those of which the gallant squadrons of the King were
composed. It was necessary to look for recruits who were not mere
mercenaries, for recruits of decent station and grave character,
fearing God and zealous for public liberty. With such men he
filled his own regiment, and, while he subjected them to a
discipline more rigid than had ever before been known in England,
he administered to their intellectual and moral nature stimulants
of fearful potency.
The events of the year 1644 fully proved the superiority of his
abilities. In the south, where Essex held the command, the
parliamentary forces underwent a succession of shameful
disasters; but in the north the victory of Marston Moor fully
compensated for all that had been lost elsewhere. That victory
was not a more serious blow to the Royalists than to the party
which had hitherto been dominant at Westminster, for it was
notorious that the day, disgracefully lost by the Presbyterians,
had been retrieved by the energy of Cromwell, and by the steady
valour of the warriors whom he had trained.
These events produced the Selfdenying Ordinance and the new model
of the army. Under decorous pretexts, and with every mark of
respect, Essex and most of those who had held high posts under
him were removed; and the conduct of the war was intrusted to
very different hands. Fairfax, a brave soldier, but of mean
understanding and irresolute temper, was the nominal Lord General
of the forces; but Cromwell was their real head.
Cromwell made haste to organise the whole army on the same
principles on which he had organised his own regiment. As soon as
this process was complete, the event of the war was decided. The
Cavaliers had now to encounter natural courage equal to their
own, enthusiasm stronger than their own, and discipline such as
was utterly wanting to them. It soon became a proverb that the
soldiers of Fairfax and Cromwell were men of a different breed
from the soldiers of Essex. At Naseby took place the first great
encounter between the Royalists and the remodelled army of the
Houses. The victory of the Roundheads was complete and decisive.
It was followed by other triumphs in rapid succession. In a few
months the authority of the Parliament was fully established over
the whole kingdom. Charles fled to the Scots, and was by them, in
a manner which did not much exalt their national character,
delivered up to his English subjects.
While the event of the war was still doubtful, the Houses had put
the Primate to death, had interdicted, within the sphere of their
authority, the use of the Liturgy, and had required all men to
subscribe that renowned instrument known by the name of the
Solemn League and Covenant. Covenanting work, as it was called,
went on fast. Hundreds of thousands affixed their names to the
rolls, and, with hands lifted up towards heaven, swore to
endeavour, without respect of persons, the extirpation of Popery
and Prelacy, heresy and schism, and to bring to public trial and
condign punishment all who should hinder the reformation of
religion. When the struggle was over, the work of innovation and
revenge was pushed on with increased ardour. The ecclesiastical
polity of the kingdom was remodelled. Most of the old clergy were
ejected from their benefices. Fines, often of ruinous amount,
were laid on the Royalists, already impoverished by large aids
furnished to the King. Many estates were confiscated. Many
proscribed Cavaliers found it expedient to purchase, at an
enormous cost, the projection of eminent members of the
victorious party. Large domains, belonging to the crown, to the
bishops, and to the chapters, were seized, and either granted
away or put up to auction. In consequence of these spoliations, a
great part of the soil of England was at once offered for sale.
As money was scarce, as the market was glutted, as the title was
insecure and as the awe inspired by powerful bidders prevented
free competition, the prices were often merely nominal. Thus many
old and honourable families disappeared and were heard of no
more; and many new men rose rapidly to affluence.
But, while the Houses were employing their authority thus, it
suddenly passed out of their hands. It had been obtained by
calling into existence a power which could not be controlled. In
the summer of 1647, about twelve months after the last fortress
of the Cavaliers had submitted to the Parliament, the Parliament
was compelled to submit to its own soldiers.
Thirteen years followed, during which England was, under various
names and forms, really governed by the sword. Never before that
time, or since that time, was the civil power in our country
subjected to military dictation.
The army which now became supreme in the state was an army very
different from any that has since been seen among us. At present
the pay of the common soldier is not such as can seduce any but
the humblest class of English labourers from their calling. A
barrier almost impassable separates him from the commissioned
officer. The great majority of those who rise high in the service
rise by purchase. So numerous and extensive are the remote
dependencies of England, that every man who enlists in the line
must expect to pass many years in
which he had learned in the war of the Palatinate did not save
him from the disgrace of being surprised and baffled by such a
Captain as Rupert, who could claim no higher fame than that of an
enterprising partisan.
Nor were the officers who held the chief commissions under Essex
qualified to supply what was wanting in him. For this, indeed,
the Houses are scarcely to be blamed. In a country which had not,
within the memory of the oldest person living, made war on a
great scale by land, generals of tried skill and valour were not
to be found. It was necessary, therefore, in the first instance,
to trust untried men; and the preference was naturally given to
men distinguished either by their station, or by the abilities
which they had displayed in Parliament. In scarcely a single
instance, however, was the selection fortunate. Neither the
grandees nor the orators proved good soldiers. The Earl of
Stamford, one of the greatest nobles of England, was routed by
the Royalists at Stratton. Nathaniel Fiennes, inferior to none of
his contemporaries in talents for civil business, disgraced
himself by the pusillanimous surrender of Bristol. Indeed, of all
the statesmen who at this juncture accepted high military
commands, Hampden alone appears to have carried into the camp the
capacity and strength of mind which had made him eminent in
politics.
When the war had lasted a year, the advantage was decidedly with
the Royalists. They were victorious, both in the western and in
the northern counties. They had wrested Bristol, the second city
in the kingdom, from the Parliament. They had won several
battles, and had not sustained a single serious or ignominious
defeat. Among the Roundheads adversity had begun to produce
dissension and discontent. The Parliament was kept in alarm,
sometimes by plots, and sometimes by riots. It was thought
necessary to fortify London against the royal army, and to hang
some disaffected citizens at their own doors. Several of the most
distinguished peers who had hitherto remained at Westminster fled
to the court at Oxford; nor can it be doubted that, if the
operations of the Cavaliers had, at this season, been directed by
a sagacious and powerful mind, Charles would soon have marched in
triumph to Whitehall.
But the King suffered the auspicious moment to pass away; and it
never returned. In August 1643 he sate down before the city of
Gloucester. That city was defended by the inhabitants and by the
garrison, with a determination such as had not, since the
commencement of the war, been shown by the adherents of the
Parliament. The emulation of London was excited. The trainbands
of the City volunteered to march wherever their services might be
required. A great force was speedily collected, and began to move
westward. The siege of Gloucester was raised: the Royalists in
every part of the kingdom were disheartened: the spirit of the
parliamentary party revived: and the apostate Lords, who had
lately fled from Westminster to Oxford, hastened back from Oxford
to Westminster.
And now a new and alarming class of symptoms began to appear in
the distempered body politic. There had been, from the first, in
the parliamentary party, some men whose minds were set on objects
from which the majority of that party would have shrunk with
horror. These men were, in religion, Independents. They conceived
that every Christian congregation had, under Christ, supreme
jurisdiction in things spiritual; that appeals to provincial and
national synods were scarcely less unscriptural than appeals to
the Court of Arches, or to the Vatican; and that Popery, Prelacy,
and Presbyterianism were merely three forms of one great
apostasy. In politics, the Independents were, to use the phrase
of their time, root and branch men, or, to use the kindred phrase
of our own time, radicals. Not content with limiting the power of
the monarch, they were desirous to erect a commonwealth on the
ruins of the old English polity. At first they had been
inconsiderable, both in numbers and in weight; but before the war
had lasted two years they became, not indeed the largest, but the
most powerful faction in the country. Some of the old
parliamentary leaders had been removed by death; and others had
forfeited the public confidence. Pym had been borne, with
princely honours, to a grave among the Plantagenets. Hampden had
fallen, as became him, while vainly endeavouring, by his heroic
example, to inspire his followers with courage to face the fiery
cavalry of Rupert. Bedford had been untrue to the cause.
Northumberland was known to be lukewarm. Essex and his
lieutenants had shown little vigour and ability in the conduct of
military operations. At such a conjuncture it was that the
Independent party, ardent, resolute, and uncompromising, began to
raise its head, both in the camp and in the House of Commons.
The soul of that party was Oliver Cromwell. Bred to peaceful
occupations, he had, at more than forty years of age, accepted a
commission in the parliamentary army. No sooner had he become a
soldier than he discerned, with the keen glance of genius, what
Essex, and men like Essex, with all their experience, were unable
to perceive. He saw precisely where the strength of the Royalists
lay, and by what means alone that strength could be overpowered.
He saw that it was necessary to reconstruct the army of the
Parliament. He saw also that there were abundant and excellent
materials for the purpose, materials less showy, indeed, but more
solid, than those of which the gallant squadrons of the King were
composed. It was necessary to look for recruits who were not mere
mercenaries, for recruits of decent station and grave character,
fearing God and zealous for public liberty. With such men he
filled his own regiment, and, while he subjected them to a
discipline more rigid than had ever before been known in England,
he administered to their intellectual and moral nature stimulants
of fearful potency.
The events of the year 1644 fully proved the superiority of his
abilities. In the south, where Essex held the command, the
parliamentary forces underwent a succession of shameful
disasters; but in the north the victory of Marston Moor fully
compensated for all that had been lost elsewhere. That victory
was not a more serious blow to the Royalists than to the party
which had hitherto been dominant at Westminster, for it was
notorious that the day, disgracefully lost by the Presbyterians,
had been retrieved by the energy of Cromwell, and by the steady
valour of the warriors whom he had trained.
These events produced the Selfdenying Ordinance and the new model
of the army. Under decorous pretexts, and with every mark of
respect, Essex and most of those who had held high posts under
him were removed; and the conduct of the war was intrusted to
very different hands. Fairfax, a brave soldier, but of mean
understanding and irresolute temper, was the nominal Lord General
of the forces; but Cromwell was their real head.
Cromwell made haste to organise the whole army on the same
principles on which he had organised his own regiment. As soon as
this process was complete, the event of the war was decided. The
Cavaliers had now to encounter natural courage equal to their
own, enthusiasm stronger than their own, and discipline such as
was utterly wanting to them. It soon became a proverb that the
soldiers of Fairfax and Cromwell were men of a different breed
from the soldiers of Essex. At Naseby took place the first great
encounter between the Royalists and the remodelled army of the
Houses. The victory of the Roundheads was complete and decisive.
It was followed by other triumphs in rapid succession. In a few
months the authority of the Parliament was fully established over
the whole kingdom. Charles fled to the Scots, and was by them, in
a manner which did not much exalt their national character,
delivered up to his English subjects.
While the event of the war was still doubtful, the Houses had put
the Primate to death, had interdicted, within the sphere of their
authority, the use of the Liturgy, and had required all men to
subscribe that renowned instrument known by the name of the
Solemn League and Covenant. Covenanting work, as it was called,
went on fast. Hundreds of thousands affixed their names to the
rolls, and, with hands lifted up towards heaven, swore to
endeavour, without respect of persons, the extirpation of Popery
and Prelacy, heresy and schism, and to bring to public trial and
condign punishment all who should hinder the reformation of
religion. When the struggle was over, the work of innovation and
revenge was pushed on with increased ardour. The ecclesiastical
polity of the kingdom was remodelled. Most of the old clergy were
ejected from their benefices. Fines, often of ruinous amount,
were laid on the Royalists, already impoverished by large aids
furnished to the King. Many estates were confiscated. Many
proscribed Cavaliers found it expedient to purchase, at an
enormous cost, the projection of eminent members of the
victorious party. Large domains, belonging to the crown, to the
bishops, and to the chapters, were seized, and either granted
away or put up to auction. In consequence of these spoliations, a
great part of the soil of England was at once offered for sale.
As money was scarce, as the market was glutted, as the title was
insecure and as the awe inspired by powerful bidders prevented
free competition, the prices were often merely nominal. Thus many
old and honourable families disappeared and were heard of no
more; and many new men rose rapidly to affluence.
But, while the Houses were employing their authority thus, it
suddenly passed out of their hands. It had been obtained by
calling into existence a power which could not be controlled. In
the summer of 1647, about twelve months after the last fortress
of the Cavaliers had submitted to the Parliament, the Parliament
was compelled to submit to its own soldiers.
Thirteen years followed, during which England was, under various
names and forms, really governed by the sword. Never before that
time, or since that time, was the civil power in our country
subjected to military dictation.
The army which now became supreme in the state was an army very
different from any that has since been seen among us. At present
the pay of the common soldier is not such as can seduce any but
the humblest class of English labourers from their calling. A
barrier almost impassable separates him from the commissioned
officer. The great majority of those who rise high in the service
rise by purchase. So numerous and extensive are the remote
dependencies of England, that every man who enlists in the line
must expect to pass many years in
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