e
disposal of his son. He also privately informed the King of the solemn
promise he had made to Evellin, and obtained an assurance that the
service of Eustace should never be required so as to incur a breach of
that obligation; and further, that if no other restrictions could
prevail, his own commands should confine the volunteer to the defence of
Oxford, which was now threatened with a siege by the advancing armies of
the Earl of Essex and Sir William Waller.

When we contemplate the miseries incident to civil war in a remote age,
our views are fixed on the effects of discord, as visible in the
contentions of two great opposing parties; we do not consider either the
minor factions into which each body is split, or the distracted counsels
and inefficient measures which constantly occur, when it is known that
the restraint of prescriptive authority is necessarily relaxed, and that
he who ought to govern and reward, is compelled to submit to controul
and to sue for favour. When the head of a community is humbled, every
member thinks he has a right to pre-eminence; and thus a war, begun
under the pretence of subduing a tyrant, eventually creates multitudes
of petty despots, only contemptible, because their sphere of oppression
is small. In the King's council, the wisdom of Southampton, the
moderation of Falkland, and the integrity of Hyde, had to contend with
the pride and petulance of those who would not lower their own
pretensions in deference to the public good, or forgive a private wrong
for the sake of that unity which alone could secure the whole. In the
army discord was equally prevalent; the generals accusing each other on
every mischance, panting for superiority, and all offended at the
hauteur of Prince Rupert, and jealous of the influence of Lord Digby.
The Parliament was still more divided; in it that party was now
ripening, which finally overturned every branch of the constitution, and
founded a most oppressive but vigorous tyranny on its ruins.

The old republican leaders, or commonwealth's men, as they were called,
began to see that self-preservation required their re-union with the
King; but the aspiring Cromwell and his crafty adherents, relying on
their numbers and influence in the army, resolved to clog every proposal
of peace with terms which they knew the Sovereign must from conscience
refuse. Of the generals who commanded their armies, the Earl of Essex
was already known to have seen his error, in su