Rod appeared to summon them to meet his Highness
in the Other House. Arranging that the Sergeant-at-Arms should carry
the mace with him, and stand by the Speaker with the mace at his
shoulder through the whole interview with his Highness, the House
obeyed the summons.[1]

[Footnote 1: Commons Journals, Jan. 20, 1657-8, et seq.; Ludlow,
596-597; List of the 43 who sat in the Upper House in pamphlet of
1659 already cited, called _A Second Narrative_, &c.]

Cromwell's speech to the two Houses (Speech XVI.) opened
significantly with the words "_My Lords, and Gentlemen of the House
of Commons_." It was a very quiet speech, somewhat slowly and
heavily delivered, with "peace" for the key-word. He represented the
nation as now in such a nourishing state, especially in the
possession of a settled and efficient Public Ministry of the Gospel,
and at the same time of ample religious liberty for all, that nothing
more was needed than oblivion of past differences, and a hearty
co-operation of the two Houses with each other, and with himself.
Apologizing for being too ill to discourse more at length, he asked
Lord Commissioner Fiennes to do so for him. The speech of Fiennes was
essentially a continuation in the same strain, but with a
gorgeousness and variety of metaphor, Biblical and poetical, in
description of the new era of peace and its duties, utterly beyond
the bounds of usual Parliamentary oratory even then, and to which
Cromwell and the rest, with all their experience of metaphor from the
pulpit, must have listened with astonishment. "Jacob, speaking to his
son Joseph, said _I had not thought to have seen thy face, and lo!
God hath showed me thy seed, also:_ meaning his two sons, Ephraim
and Manasseh. And may not many amongst us well say some years hence
_We had not thought to have seen a Chief Magistrate again among us,
and lo! God hath shown us a Chief Magistrate in his Two Houses of
Parliament?_ Now may the good God make them like Ephraim and
Manasseh, that the Three Nations may be blessed in them, saying
_God made thee like these Two Houses of Parliament, which two, like
Leah and Rachel, did build the House of God!_ May you do worthily
in Ephrata, and be famous in Bethlehem!" There was more of the same
kind, including a comparison of the new constitution of the
_Petition and Advice_ to the perfected eduction of the orderly
universe out of chaos. It was the speech of a Puritan Jean Paul.[1]

[Footnote 1: Carlyle, III.