by Cromwell Thus he progressed from New-market to Royston thence by S. Albans to Hatfeild to Windsor being carried towards London almost in the same Road in which he was driven thence to Caversham back again to Maiden-head to Latimer Stoke Oatlands Sion-House almost in view and hearing of those Tumults which forced him away while in the interim Oliver having made a Pique against the Citizens and revenged one Tumult by another had made the City Submit and receive the Domineering Army in Triumph through their Streets with Lawrel and other Ensigns of victory in their hats With the Army returned those Fugitive Members that left the Parliament upon the same Tumults being invited by Cromwell to his Sanctuary of Redcoats while the remaining members had voted the Kings present coming to London to treat personally with his two Houses all which votes being Tumultuously obtained by instinct of some of Cromwell's own sending to encrease the violence were afterwards vacated after a long struggling in the Parliament as contrary to Priviledge and the secluded Members who had resumed their seats deserted London and went some over Sea others with passes to their own homes in the Country resigning their ill employed power to Cromwell and his Faction in the Parliament who abused it ten times more In Justification of this insolence they published a Declaration wherein they said that the Parliament had declared that it is no resistance of Magistracy to side with just principles and the Law of Nature and Nations being the same Law upon which they had assisted them that the soldiers may lawfully hold the hands of the Generall who will turn his Cannon upon the Army on purpose to destroy them The Seamen the hands of the Pilot who willfully runs the Ship upon a Rock as their Brethren the Scotch-men had also argued The said Declaration still-directing them to the equitable sense of all Laws and constitutions as dispensing with the very letter of the same and being supreme to it when the safety and preservation of all is concerned and assured them That all Authority is fundamentally seated in the Office anâ but ministerially in the persons But before this great successe the dubious Expectation thereof had caused Cromwell to stagger now and then at his first resolutions which it prosperous would at all times help themselves and there ultimately he was fixed whatever conditions and promises cross accidents should extort from him and therefore he was dealing with the King in way of recompence and reward for his Service in his restitution that he should be made Earl of Essex and a Knight of the Garter his eldest Son to be of the Bedchamber to the Prince his Son in Law Ireton to be either Lord Deputy or at least Feild Marshall Generall of Ireland and it was reported by Henry Cromwell that then Commanded the Generalls Lifeguard that the King had put himself upon his Father and Brother Ireton to make his terms for him and restore him to his Crown which grant of the Kings caused and produced those proposals beforementioned to be contrived but now in the very nick of this Juncture set forth and published called the Proposals for the setling a just and lawfull peace where in the three first and last particulars the Authority was left as entire in the King as before the rest were some Caprichio's of Bienniall Parliaments and the like Figaries whose impertinences discredited the important veracity of the other But this feud betwixt the Presbyterians and Cromwell ending so fortunately for him there being nothing at present to withstand his first and grand intendment he began to waive his respects to the King and cast off those disguises wherewith he had made himself acceptable to the Kings adhaerents and laid aside the King and them The King therefore gently reminds Cromwell of his promises repeats to him his Protestations and urgeth the Proposals aforesaid and not only so but in confidence of the fair meaning of the Army declines a speedier accommodation with the Parliament but Cromwell begins to turn a deaf ear to deny many things what he had said and promised to retract from others pretending the difference of times and circumstances that they cannot be performed telling the King moreover that He did mistake and not rightly understand his meaning and in short that though he would keep his word with His Majesty that now it was not in his power for that the Adjutators were grown to such an ungoverned and insolent licentiousnesse that untill the Discipline of the Army could be recovered it were in vain to expect any such things as he when he promised really intended The King was at this time at Hampton-Court perplext on the one hand with the obstinacy of the Parliament in their Propositions being more rigid since the last garbling by the Army and on the other with the dangerous Positions of the Adjutators and the Levelling party both in Camp and City in which last John Lilburn was Chief of the Faction who decryed Monarchy and all former forms of Government having something which Ireton spread by the by as it were among the Souldiery in projection on purpose to stave off all manner and means of settlement This at last came to a Systeme or Consistency and was styled an Agreement of the people and was now the onely darling of the Army and the Sectaries being a mixture or miscellany of Politique Notions no way practicable among English-men being a deformation or destruction of all things but an establishment of nothing a meer temporary expedient and shift of design except always their Arrears Indemnity and the Period to the Parliament and this shape Cromwell assumes also confessing and acknowledging the excellence acquity and goodnesse of the same the only fault in it was the unseasonablenesse for as yet it was not his time and his cue to appear so publiquely against the King and this his Character of it was drest out and enlarged with such taking Saint-like Language as the Phanatick rabble might best be surprized and not suspect any of his own venemous designs to be lurking under the leaf of His holy and sacred pretences Withall when his Plot against the King vvas ripe for Execution he caused a Fast to be published in the Army a certain forerunner of mischief with him where he was as usually observed to howl and cry and bedew his Cheeks with the Tears of Hypocrisie cruelty and deceit and after this mock-duty performed he and the rest of the Officers pretended to confesse their iniquity and abomination in declining the Cause of the people and tampering with the King and then in the presence of the All-seeing God acknowledge the way of an Agreement of the People to be the way to peace and freedom The King was in the mean while by the fallacious advice of Whalley and the practises of Cromwell who had caused frequent rumours to be whispered of some Assassinate intended by the Levellers against his person frighted
told him He should be like unto a God From this he passed unto another more manly their the robbing of Dove-houses stealing the young Pidgeons and eating and merchandizing of them and that so publiquely that he became dreadfully suspect to all the adjacent Countrey and this was an unhappy allusory Omen of his after Actions when he Robb'd the King his Soveraign of his Innocence and Vertues and prostituted them to the People and Soul â—ery and made the World about him afraid of his Villanies 'T was at this time of his Adolescency that he dreamed or a Familiar rather instincted him and put it into his Head that he should be King of England for it cannot be conceived that now there should be any such near resemblance of truth in Dreams and Divinations besides the Considence with which he â—epeated it and the difficulty to make him forget the Arrogant Conceit and opinionated pride he had of himself doth seem to evince it was some impulse of a Spirit since they have ceased long agoe However the Thought or Vision came most certain it is that his Father was exceedingly troubled at it and having angerly rebuked him for the Vanity and Idlenesse and Impudence thereof and seeing him yet persist in the presumption thereof caused Dr. Beard to whip him for them which was done to no more purpose than the rest of his Chastisements his Scholar growing insolent and uncorrigible from those results and svvasions within him to which all other dictates and Instructions were uselesse and as a dead letter Now to confirm this Royal Humour the more in his ambitious and vainglorious brain it happened as it was then generally the Custome in all great Free-Schools that a Play called The five Senses was to be Acted by the Scholars of this School and Oliver Cromwell as a Confident Youth was named to Act the part of Tactus the sense of Feeling in the personation of which as he came out of the Tyring roome upon the Stage his Head encircled with a Chaplet of Lawrel he stumbled at a Crown purposely laid there which stooping down he took up and Crovvned himself therevvithall adding beyond his Cue some Majestical mighty vvords and vvith this passage also the Event of his Life held good analogie and proportion vvhen he changed the Lavvrel of his Victories in the late unnatural War to all the Povver Authority and Splendor that can be imagined vvithin the Compasse of a Crovvn Nevertheless the Relation of a Father and one so stern and strict an Examiner of him he being in his ovvn nature of a difficult disposition and great spirit and one that would have due distances observed towards him from all persons which begat him reverence from the Countrey-people kept him in some awe and subjection till his translation to Cambridge where he was placed in Sydney Colledge more to satisfie his Fathers curiosity and desire than out of any hopes of Completing him in his Studies which never reached any good knowledge of the Latine Tongue During his short residence here where he was more Famous for his Exercises in the Feilds than in the Schools in which he never had the honour of because no worth and merit to a degree being one of the chief Match-makers and Players at Foot-ball Cudgels or any other boystrous sport or game His Father Mr. Robert Cromwell died leaving him to the scope of his own inordinate and irregular will swayed by the bent of very violent and strong passions There is little to be said more of his Father that is requisite to his Sons Story further than this that whereas 't is reported Oliver kept a Brew-House that is a mistake for the Brew-house was kept in his Fathers time and managed by his Mother and his Fathers Servants without any concernment of either of these therein the Accompts being alwayes given to the Mistris who after her Husbands death did continue in the same Employment and Calling of a Brewer and thought it no disparagement to sustain the Estate and port of a younger Brother as Mr. Robert Cromwell was by those lawful means however not so reputable as other gains and Trades are accounted It was not long after his Death er'e Oliver weary of the Muses and that strict course of Life though he gave latitude enough to it in his wilde salleys and flyings out abandoned the University and returned Home faluted with the Name of young Mr. Cromwell now in the room and place of his Father which how he became his uncontrolled debaucheries did publiquely declare for Drinking Wenching and the like outrages of licentious youth none so insam'd as this young Tarquin who would not be contraried in his Lusts in the very strain and to the excesse of that Regal Ravisher These pranks made his Mother advise with her self and his friends what she should do with him and to remove the Scandal which had been cast upon the Family by his means and therefore it was concluded to send him to one of the Inns of Court under pretence of his studying the Laws where among the masse of people in London and frequency of Vices of all sorts His might passe in the throng without that particular reflection upon his relation and at worst the infamy should stick only on himself Lincolns-Inne was the place pitch'd upon and thither Mr. Cromwell in a sutable Garb to his fortunes was sent where but for a very little while he continued for the nature of the place and the Studies there were so far regretful beyond all his tedious Apprentiship to the more facile Academick Sciences by reason Laws were the bar and obstacle of his impetuous resolutions and the quite contrary to his loose and libertine spirit that he had a kind of antipathy to his Company and Converse there and so spent his time in an inward spight which for that space superseded the enormous extravagancy of his former vitiousnesse His Vices having a certain kind of intermission succession or transmigration like a complete revolution of wickednesse into one another So that few of his Feats were practised here and it is some kind of good luck for that honourable Society that he hath lest so small and so innocent a Memorial of his Membership therein His next traverse was back again into the country to his Mother and there he fell to his old trade and frequented his old haunts consumed his money in tipling and then ran on score per force in his drink he used to be so quarrelsome as few unlesse as mad as himself durst keep him company his chief weapon in which he delighted and at which he fought several times with â—inkâ—ers Pedlars and the like who most an end go armed therewith was a Quarterstaff in which he was so skilful that seldome did any over-match him A boysterous discipline and Rudiment of his martial skill and valour which with so much fiercenesse he manifested afterward in the ensuing War These and the like strange wild and dishonest actions
were made Serjeants and Mr. Hales one of the Justices of the Common-Pleas where St. Johns yet sate and of the Cabinet to his Protector besides having preferred his Man Thurloe his Secretary at the Hague to be his Secretary of State the Candle or Light of that Dark-Lanthorn which St. Johns was said to be in these mysterious times of Cromwell in all his attempts and designs of consequence and moment The Dutch Peace was also concluded on by the Ambassadors and the Commissioners of the said â—ouncil for the Protector between whom this private Article was agreed that the Prince of Aurange should never be restored to the Dignities Offices and charge his Ancestors held and enjoyed and this was urged for the better conservation of the Peace which would in his Restitution be endangered because of his Relation to the King The Protector dined in great State upon an Invitation from the Lord Mayor c. at Grocers-Hall the 8. of February being Ashwednesday a very unsuitable day for any Festival but his Entertainment who inverted all things the streets being railed from Temple Bar thither the Liveries in their Gowns in their gradual standings awaiting Him he was met at the said Gate by Alderman Viner the Lord Mayor who delivered him the Sword there and having received it from him back again bore it on Horseback before him all the way through which the same silence was kept as if a Funeral had been en passant and no doubt it was that muteness which Tacitus mentioned in Tiberius quale Magnae Irae vel magni metus est silentium no apprecations or so much as a How do ye being given during the Cavalcade After Dinner he was served with a Banquet in the conclusion whereof he Knighted Alderman Viner and would have done the same to the Recorder Steel for his learned Speech of Government calculated and measured for him but he for good Reasons avoided it My Lord Maior was forced to carry it home and anger his Wife with it who had real Honour both in her Name and Nature Oliver at his return had the second course of a Brick-bat from the top of a House in the Strand by St. Clements which light upon his Coach and almost spoiled his Digestion with the daringness of the affront search was made but in vain the person could not be found and vengeance was not yet from Heaven to rain upon him He published a little after an Ordinance for the Trial and Approbation of Ministers wherein Phillp Nye Goodwin Hugh Peters Mr. Manton and others were named Commissioners the question these men put to the Examinants was not of Abilities or Learning but grace in their hearts and that with to bold and saucy Inquisition that some mens spirits trembled at their Interrogatories they phrasing it so as if as was said of the Council of Trent they had the Holy Ghost in a Cloak Bag or were rather Simon Magus his own Disciples and certainly there were never such Symoniacks in the World not a living of value but what a Friend or the best purchaser was admitted into to which humane learning even where a former right was was a good and sufficient Bar no less to the ruine then scandal of the Church of England and the Protestant Religion and Professors thereof â—everal ignorant bold Laicks being inducted into the best Spiritualities as best consisted with Olivers Interest which depended upon the Sectary and their hideous divisions in Religion To return During those Protectoral Intrigues the King's Interest had got such footing again in England that all or most of the Gentlemen and Counties thereof were engaged for it and therefore while Lambert managed one Province the Affairs of the Parliament wherein Oliver would not descend so low as to be pragmatical and Sceptically busy with their Debates against His power as wrested and usurped from the people He was mainly intent upon the proceedings of the Royallists the particulars whereof he had betrayed to him weekly a constant correspondence being held betwixt Him and one Manning a Retainer and Under-Secretary to the King at Colen his Father being killed in his Service at Alresford in the year 1644. The price of this Treason was no lesse then 6000. l. a year most whereof came to the King by this fellows hands as sent over by his and his friends procurement but on purpose by so notable a service in the Kings necessities to sâ—rue himself into the secrets of His Majesties designs Hence came the Western Association and Attempt of the noble Penruddock in the West to be so suddenly defeated with the like Insurrections in several parts of England in the year 1654. For upon certain notice of the days appointed for their rising Cromwell to be before hand with them gave out supposed and false days and made the like Appearances particularly at Shrewsbury by which means the Confederates came to perceive there was some Treachery among themselves and did then wisely desist from the danger of taking publique Arms against Him For a fuller accompt of all which I must refer the Reader to the Histories of the Times lately published though I should take notice of his cruelty against those unfortunate Gentlemen The Event of this by which he had overreached the King in his own designs and the Hopes of his rich successes in the West-Indies by robbing another Prince whether his Fleet and Army under General Pen and Venables was now arrived which also I shall only mention for the Story is trite and vulgar made Oliver most blith and confident and his Court of Beggars and such like mean people very gay and jocund A great deal of State was now used towards him and the French Cringe and other ceremonious pieces of gallantry and good deportment which were thought unchristian and favouring of Carnality introduced in place of austere and down looks and the silent Mummery of Starch'd and Hypocritical gravity the only becoming Dress forsooth of Piety and Religion He had now a Guard of Halberdiers in Gray Coats welted with black Velvet over whom Walter Strickland was Captain and a Lord Chamberlain Sir Gilbert Pickering Two Masters of Requests Mr. Bacon and Mr. Sad'er a Master of his Horse his Son Claypoolâ— and generally all persons of Honour both to His own person and his Wives who very frugally Huswifed it and would nicely and finically tax the expensive unthriftiness as said she of the Other Woman who lived there before her But I must not engage in her impertinencies though a many pretty stories might be told of this obsolete Princesse It will be requisite to speak something of his manner and course of Life now raised to a very neer fruition of the Soveraignty this being the Solstice of his Fortunes His Custome was now to divert himself frequently at Hampton-Court which he had saved from Sale with other Houses of the Kings for his own greatnesse whether he went and came in post with his Guards behind and before as not yet