excluded.
Lastly, what right had the Commons to admit a negative voice, either in
another house or in a single person? Such a voice was destructive of the
sovereignty of the people exercised by their representatives. The people
had sent them to parliament with power to make laws for the national
welfare, but not to annihilate the first and most valuable right of their
constituents. Each day the debate grew more animated and personal; charges
were made and recriminations followed: the republicans enumerated the acts
of misrule and oppression under the government of the late protector; the
courtiers balanced the account with similar instances from the proceedings
of their adversaries during the sway of the long parliament; the orators,
amidst the

[Footnote 1: Thurloe, 559, 609, 615.]

[Sidenote a: A.D. 1659. Feb. 1.]

multitude of subjects incidentally introduced, lost sight of the original
question; and the speaker, after a debate of eight days, declared that he
was bewildered in a labyrinth of confusion, out of which he could discover
no issue. Weariness at last induced the combatants to listen to a
compromise,[a] that the recognition of Richard as protector should form
part of a future bill, but that at the same time, his prerogative should be
so limited as to secure the liberties of the people. Each party expressed
its satisfaction. The republicans had still the field open for the advocacy
of their favourite doctrines; the protectorists had advanced a step,
and trusted that it would lead them to the acquisition of greater
advantages.[1]

From the office of protector, the members proceeded to inquire into the
constitution and powers of the other house; and this question, as it was
intimately connected with the former, was debated with equal warmth and
pertinacity. The opposition appealed to the "engagement," which many of the
members had subscribed; contended that the right of calling a second
house had been personal to the late protector, and did not descend to
his successors; urged the folly of yielding a negative voice on their
proceedings to a body of counsellors of their own creation; and pretended
to foretel that a protector with a yearly income of one million three
hundred thousand pounds, and a house of lords selected by himself, must
inevitably become, in the course of a few years, master of the liberties of
the people. When, at the end of nine days, the speaker was going to put the
question, Sir

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