This was the last naval victory achieved under the auspices of the
parliament, which, though it wielded the powers of government with an
energy that surprised

[Footnote 1: Heath, 335. Whitelock, 551. Leicester's Journal, 138. Le
Clerc, i. 328. Basnage, i. 298-301. By the English admirals the loss of the
Dutch was estimated at eleven men-of-war and thirty merchantmen.]

[Sidenote a: A.D. 1653. Feb. 18.]
[Sidenote b: A.D. 1653. Feb. 19.]
[Sidenote c: A.D. 1653. Feb. 20.]

the several nations of Europe, was doomed to bend before the superior
genius or ascendancy of Cromwell. When that adventurer first formed the
design of seizing the supreme authority, is uncertain; it was not till
after the victory at Worcester that he began gradually and cautiously to
unfold his object. He saw himself crowned with the laurels of conquest; he
held the command in chief of a numerous and devoted army; and he dwelt with
his family in a palace formerly the residence of the English monarchs. His
adversaries had long ago pronounced him, in all but name, "a king;" and his
friends were accustomed to address him in language as adulatory as ever
gratified the ears of the most absolute sovereign.[1] His importance was
perpetually forced upon his notice by the praise of his dependants, by the
foreign envoys who paid court to him, and by the royalists who craved
his protection. In such circumstances, it cannot be surprising if the
victorious general indulged the aspirings of ambition; if the stern
republican, however he might hate to see the crown on the brows of another,
felt no repugnance to place it upon his own.

The grandees of the army felt that they no longer possessed the chief sway
in the government. War had called them away to their commands in Scotland
and Ireland; and, during their absence, the conduct of affairs had devolved
on those who, in contradistinction, were denominated the statesmen. Thus,
by the course

[Footnote 1: The general officers conclude their despatches to him thus:
"We humbly lay ourselves with these thoughts, in this emergency, at your
excellency's feet."--Milton's State Papers, 71. The ministers of Newcastle
make "their humble addresses to his godly wisdom," and present "their
humble suits to God and his excellency" (ibid. 82); and the petitioners
from different countries solicit him to mediate for them to the parliament,
"because God has not put the sword in his hand in vain."--Whitelock, 517.]

of events,