by the Commons that he should be
brought to trial. On January 2, 1649, it was voted that, in making war
against the Parliament, he had been guilty of treason; and a high court
was appointed to try him. One hundred fifty commissioners were to
compose the court--peers, members of the Commons, aldermen of London.
The ordinance was sent to the Upper House and was rejected. On the 6th a
fresh ordinance, declaring that the people being, after God, the source
of all just power, the representatives of the people are the supreme
power in the nation; and that whatsoever is enacted or declared for law
by the Commons in Parliament hath the force of a law, and the people are
concluded thereby, though the consent of king or peers be not had
thereto.

Asserting this power, so utterly opposed either to the ancient
constitution of the monarchy or to the possible working of a republic,
there was no hesitation in constituting the high court of justice in the
name of the Commons alone. The number of members of the court was now
reduced to one hundred thirty-five. They had seven preparatory meetings,
at which only fifty-eight members attended. "All men," says Mrs.
Hutchinson, "were left to their free liberty of acting, neither
persuaded nor compelled; and as there were some nominated in the
commission who never sat, and others who sat at first but durst not hold
on, so all the rest might have declined it if they would when it is
apparent they should have suffered nothing by so doing."

Algernon Sidney, although bent upon a republic, opposed the trial,
apprehending that the project of a commonwealth would fail if the King's
life were touched. It is related that Cromwell, irritated by these
scruples, exclaimed: "No one will stir. I tell you, we will cut his head
off with the crown upon it." Such daring may appear the result of
ambition or fear or revenge or innate cruelty in a few men who had
obtained a temporary ascendency. These men were, on the contrary, the
organs of a widespread determination among thousands throughout the
country, who had long preached and argued and prophesied about vengeance
on "the great delinquent"; and who had ever in their mouths the text
that "blood defileth the land, and the land cannot be cleansed of the
blood that is shed therein, but by the blood of him that shed it."[40]
They had visions of a theocracy, and were impatient of an earthly king.

Do we believe, as some, not without reasonable grounds, may beli