ch had
been pressed upon him all along his march, and about which he had
hitherto been so provokingly ambiguous. Of all the pamphlets that
were coming out only those that could give him light on this question
can have been of the least interest to his rough common sense. Now,
as it happened, he could be under no mistake, after his arrival in
London, as to the strength and massiveness of that current of opinion
which had set in for a re-seating of the secluded members. Since the
first restoration of the Rump in May 1659, Prynne had been keeping
the case of the secluded members perpetually before the public in
pamphlets; and Prynne, more than any other man, had created the
feeling that now prevailed. "Conscientious, Serious, Theological and
Legal Queries propounded to the twice dissipated, self-erected,
Anti-Parliamentary Westminster Juncto"; "Six Important Queries
proposed to the Re-sitting Rump of the Long Parliament"; "Seven
Additional Queries in behalf of the Secluded Members"; "Case of the
Old secured, secluded, and twice excluded Members"; "Three Seasonable
Queries proposed to all those Cities, Counties, and Boroughs, whose
respective citizens have been forcibly excluded," &c.; "Full
Declaration": such are the titles of those of Prynne's pamphlets, the
last of a long series in one and the same strain, which were
delighting or tormenting London when Monk arrived. Many of the
secluded members were in town to await the issue, and the last-named
of Prynne's pamphlets (published Jan. 30) contained an alphabetical
list of the whole body of them. There were, it appears, 194 secluded
members then alive, besides forty who had died since 1648. If Monk
was to do anything at all, was not Prynne's way the safest and most
popular? Practically, at all events, he could now see that the
possible courses had reduced themselves to two,--(1) The Rump's own
way, or self-enlargement of the present House by new writs, issued
with all Republican precautions; (2) The City's way, or Prynne's way,
which proposed to re-insert the secluded members into the present
House, so as to make it legally the Long Parliament over again, with
its rights and engagements precisely as they had been at the time of
the last negotiations with Charles I. in 1648. For which of these two
courses he should declare himself was the question Monk had to
ponder.[1]

[Footnote 1: Thomason Pamphlets, and Catalogue of the same; Wood's
Ath. III. 870-871.]

He nearly bl