epublic; and the plans of
imaginary republics, for the settlement of the state, were every day
the topics of conversation among these armed legislators. Royalty it was
agreed to abolish: nobility must be set aside: even all ranks of men be
levelled; and a universal equality of property, as well as of power, be
introduced among the citizens. The saints, they said, were the salt of
the earth: an entire parity had place among the elect; and by the same
rule that the apostles were exalted from the most ignoble professions,
the meanest sentinel, if enlightened by the Spirit, was entitled to
equal regard with the greatest commander. In order to wean the
soldiers from these, licentious maxims, Cromwell had issued orders for
discontinuing the meetings of the agitators; and he pretended to pay
entire obedience to the parliament, whom being now fully reduced to
subjection, he purposed to make for the future, the instruments of his
authority. But the "levellers,"--for so that party in the army was
called,--having experienced the sweets of dominion, would not so
easily be deprived of it. They secretly continued their meetings: they
asserted, that their officers, as much as any part of the church
or state, needed reformation: several regiments joined in seditious
remonstrances and petitions:[*] separate rendezvouses were concerted;
and every thing tended to anarchy and confusion. But this distemper was
soon cured by the rough but dexterous hand of Cromwell. He chose the
opportunity of a review, that he might display the greater boldness,
and spread the terror the wider. He seized the ringleaders before
their companions; held in the field a council of war; shot one mutineer
instantly; and struck such dread into the rest, that they presently
threw down the symbols of sedition, which they had displayed, and
thenceforth returned to their wonted discipline and obedience.[**]

Cromwell had great deference for the counsels of Ireton, a man who,
having grafted the soldier on the lawyer the statesman on the saint,
had adopted such principles as were fitted to introduce the severest
tyranny, while they seemed to encourage the most unbounded license in
human society. Fierce in his nature, though probably sincere in his
intentions, he purposed by arbitrary power to establish liberty, and,
in prosecution of his imagined religious purposes, he thought himself
dispensed from all the ordinary rules of morality, by which inferior
mortals must allow