it became manifest that those political and religious
zealots, to whom this deed is to be ascribed, had committed, not only a
crime, but an error. They had given to a prince, hitherto known to his
people chiefly by his faults, an opportunity of displaying, on a great
theatre, before the eyes of all nations and all ages, some qualities
which irresistibly call forth the admiration and love of mankind, the
high spirit of a gallant gentleman, the patience and meekness of a
penitent Christian. Nay, they had so contrived their revenge that the
very man whose life had been a series of attacks on the liberties of
England now seemed to die a martyr in the cause of those liberties. No
demagogue ever produced such an impression on the public mind as the
captive King, who, retaining in that extremity all his regal dignity,
and confronting death with dauntless courage, gave utterance to the
feelings of his oppressed people, manfully refused to plead before
a court unknown to the law, appealed from military violence to the
principles of the constitution, asked by what right the House of Commons
had been purged of its most respectable members and the House of Lords
deprived of its legislative functions, and told his weeping hearers
that he was defending, not only his own cause, but theirs. His long
misgovernment, his innumerable perfidies, were forgotten. His memory
was, in the minds of the great majority of his subjects, associated with
those free institutions which he had, during many years, laboured to
destroy: for those free institutions had perished with him, and, amidst
the mournful silence of a community kept down by arms, had been defended
by his voice alone. From that day began a reaction in favour of monarchy
and of the exiled house, reaction which never ceased till the throne had
again been set up in all its old dignity.

At first, however, the slayers of the King seemed to have derived new
energy from that sacrament of blood by which they had bound themselves
closely together, and separated themselves for ever from the great body
of their countrymen. England was declared a commonwealth. The House of
Commons, reduced to a small number of members, was nominally the supreme
power in the state. In fact, the army and its great chief governed
everything. Oliver had made his choice. He had kept the hearts of his
soldiers, and had broken with almost every other class of his fellow
citizens. Beyond the limits of his camps and fortr