smissed from his official posts in
consequence. When he further refused to subscribe to that loan himself
he was imprisoned in the Marshalsea and at Depford. Regarding himself as
personally attacked by Buckingham, he joined the opposition. Yet, as
Firth points out, "fiercely as he attacked the King's ministers, he was
careful to exonerate the King." He concludes his list of grievances by
saying, "This hath not been done by the King, but by projectors." Again,
"Whether we shall look upon the King or his people, it did never more
behove this great physician the parliament, to effect a true consent
amongst the parties than now. Both are injured, both to be cured. By one
and the same thing hath the King and people been hurt. I speak truly
both for the interest of the King and the people."

His intention was to find some means of cooperation which would leave
the people their liberty and yet give the crown its prerogative, "Let us
make what laws we can, there must--nay, there will be a trust left in
the crown."

It will be seen by any unbiased critic that Wentworth was only half for
the people even at this time. On the other hand, it is not astonishing
that men, heart and soul for the people, should consider Wentworth's
subsequent complete devotion to the cause of the King sufficient to
brand him as an apostate. The fact that he received so many official
dignities from the King also leant color to the supposition that
personal ambition was a leading motive with him. With true dramatic
instinct Browning has centered this feeling and made the most of it in
the attitude of Pym's party, while he offsets it later in the play by
showing us the reality of the man Strafford.

There is no very authentic source for the idea also brought out in this
first scene that Strafford and Pym had been warm personal friends. The
story is told by Dr. James Welwood, one of the physicians of William
III., who, in the year 1700, published a volume entitled "Memoirs, of
the most material transactions in England for the last hundred years
preceding the Revolution of 1688." Without mentioning any source he
tells the following story; "There had been a long and intimate
friendship between Mr. Pym and him [Wentworth], and they had gone hand
in hand in everything in the House of Commons. But when Sir Thomas
Wentworth was upon making his peace with the Court, he sent to Pym to
meet him alone at Greenwich; where he began in a set speech to sound Mr.
Pym a