l was in the
army; and that army, by such a concurrence of fortuitous circumstances as
history teaches us not to be surprised at, had fallen into the hands of a
man than whom a baser could not be found in its lowest ranks. Personal
courage appears to have been Monk's only virtue; reserve and
dissimulation made up the whole stock of his wisdom. But to this man did
the nation look up, ready to receive from his orders the form of
government he should choose to prescribe. There is reason to believe
that, from the general bias of the Presbyterians, as well as of the
Cavaliers, monarchy was the prevalent wish; but it is observable that
although the Parliament was, contrary to the principle upon which it was
pretended to be called, composed of many avowed royalists, yet none dared
to hint at the restoration of the king till they had Monk's permission,
or rather command to receive and consider his letters. It is impossible,
in reviewing the whole of this transaction, not to remark that a general
who had gained his rank, reputation, and station in the service of a
republic, and of what he, as well as others, called, however falsely, the
cause of liberty, made no scruple to lay the nation prostrate at the feet
of a monarch, without a single provision in favour of that cause; and if
the promise of indemnity may seem to argue that there was some attention,
at least, paid to the safety of his associates in arms, his subsequent
conduct gives reason to suppose that even this provision was owing to any
other cause rather than to a generous feeling of his breast. For he
afterwards not only acquiesced in the insults so meanly put upon the
illustrious corpse of Blake, under whose auspices and command he had
performed the most creditable services of his life, but in the trial of
Argyle produced letters of friendship and confidence to take away the
life of a nobleman, the zeal and cordiality of whose co-operation with
him, proved by such documents, was the chief ground of his execution;
thus gratuitously surpassing in infamy those miserable wretches who, to
save their own lives, are sometimes persuaded to impeach and swear away
the lives of their accomplices.

The reign of Charles II. forms one of the most singular as well as of the
most important periods of history. It is the era of good laws and bad
government. The abolition of the court of wards, the repeal of the writ
De Heretico Comburendo, the Triennial Parliament Bill, the esta