ys of Monk's
continued residence in the City, the Rumpers vainly imploring
reconciliation with him, and the Secluded Members and their friends
gathering round him and negotiating; and, on Tuesday, Feb. 21, when
he did remove from the City to Westminster, it was with the Secluded
Members in his train, to be marched under military guard to their
seats beside the Rumpers. The writs issued by the Rump for recruiting
itself were now useless. It had been recruited in the way it least
liked, by the sudden reappearance in it of the excluded Presbyterians
and Royalists of the pre-Commonwealth period of the Long Parliament.

Far more than the mere stopping of his pamphlet was involved for
Milton in the events of that fortnight. He could construe them no
otherwise than as the breaking down of the inner rampart that
defended the Commonwealth against Charles Stuart. The _Roasting of
the Rump_ in London was but a rough popular metaphor for "Down
with the Republic"; and, had the tumult of that night extended from
the City to Westminster and the breaking of the windows of "fanatics"
become general, Milton's would not have escaped. Then, in the course
of the negotiations with Monk through the fatal fortnight, had not
the Rump itself quailed? Had they not offered to cancel the solemn
Abjuration Oath, alike for the Councillors of State and for future
members of Parliament, and to substitute only a general engagement to
be faithful to the Commonwealth, without King, Single Person, or
House of Lords? Hardly anywhere now did there seem to be that stern,
bold, uncompromising opposition to Royalty which would register
itself, as Milton wanted, in an oath before God and man, but only
that feebler Republicanism which would pledge itself with the
understood reservation of "circumstances permitting." But worst of
all was the crowning fact that the Secluded Members had been
restored. By that one stroke of Monk's all that had happened since
the Commonwealth had been set up was put in question, and the power
was given back into the hands of the very men who had protested and
struggled against the setting up of the Commonwealth eleven years
ago. How would these act? It might be hoped perhaps that some of the
more prudent among them, having regard to the lapse of time and the
change of circumstances, might not think it their duty to be as
vehemently Royalist now as they had been in 1648, and also perhaps
that the power of Monk, if Monk himself remaine