e Parliament. Monk's
march from Coldstream southwards on the 2nd of January; the vanishing
of the residue of Lambert's forces before him; the addresses to him
in the English counties all along his route; his answers or supposed
answers to these addresses; his wary behaviour to the two
Parliamentary Commissioners that had been sent to attach themselves
to him and find out his disposition in the matter of the Abjuration
Oath; his arrival at St. Alban's on the 28th of January; his message
thence to the Parliament to clear all Fleetwood's regiments out of
London and Westminster before his own entry; that entry itself on the
3rd of February, when he and his battered columns streamed in through
Gray's Inn Lane; finally his first appearance in the House and
speech, there:--of all this Milton had exact cognisance through the
newspapers of his friend Needham and otherwise. It was very puzzling
and by no means reassuring. If he had ever thought of Monk as by
possibility such a saviour of the Commonwealth as he had been longing
for, the study of the actually approaching physiognomy of Old George
all the way from Scotland, and still more Old George's first
deliverance of himself in the Parliament, must have undeceived him.
The Abjuration Oath, it appeared, was not at all to Monk's mind. He
would not take it himself in order to be qualified for the seat voted
him in the Council of State, and he plainly intimated his opinion
that the day for such oaths and engagements was past. Milton cannot
have liked that rejection by the General of one of the tests on which
he had himself placed so much reliance. But, further, what meant
Monk's very ambiguous utterance respecting the three immediate
courses one of which must be chosen? He had distinctly mentioned in
the House that the drift of public opinion, as he could ascertain it
from the addresses made to him along his march, was towards either
_an enlargement of the present House by the re-admission of the
Secluded Members_ or _a full and free Parliament by a new
general election_; and, though he had seemed to acquiesce in that
third course which was proposed by the House itself, viz. _the
enlargement of the House by a competent number of new writs issued by
itself under a careful scheme of qualification for electing or being
eligible_, he had left a very vague impression as to his real
preference. Now to Milton, as to all other ardent Commonwealth's men,
the vital question was which of thes