320-326; Commons Journals Jan. 21 and
Jan. 25, 1657-8. Fiennes's speech is given in full under the last
date, and must have much talked of. Whitlocke also prints it, IV.
315-329.]

Which of the two Houses was Ephraim and which Manasseh in Fiennes's
own fancy does not appear; but the Commons had already voted
themselves to be Ephraim, and the Other House to be the questionable
Manasseh. The Anti-Oliverians among them, now in the majority or
nearly so, had resolved that their best policy, bound as they were by
oath to the Protectorate and the new Constitution of the _Petition
and Advice_ generally, would be to question the powers of the new
House as defined in the constituting document. The definition had
been rather vague. The meaning had certainly been that the new House
should be a legislative House, standing in very much the same
relation to the Commons as the old House of Lords had done, and not
merely a Judicial High Court for certain classes of cases, with
general powers of advice to the Commons in the conduct of weighty
affairs. This, however, was what the Anti-Oliverians in the Commons
contended; and on this contention, if possible, they were to break
down the Other House and so make a gap in the new Constitution. They
had made a beginning even in the small matter of the relative claims
of Mr. Smythe, their own new Clerk, and Mr. Scobell, as general
"Clerk of the Parliament," to the possession of certain documents;
but they found a better opportunity when, at their third sitting
(Jan. 22, afternoon), they were informed that "some gentlemen were at
the door with a message from the Lords." The message was merely a
request that the Commons would join the Lords in an address to his
Highness asking him to appoint a day of humiliation throughout the
three nations; but, purporting to be from "the Lords," it cut very
deep. By a majority of seventy-five to fifty-one it was resolved
"That this House will send an answer by messengers of their own,"
i.e. that they would take time to consider the subject. Two more days
passed, the House transacting some miscellaneous business, but
nursing its resolution for a split; and, on Monday the 25th, lo! Sir
Arthur Hasilrig among them, standing up prominently and insisting on
being sworn and admitted to his seat. He had disdained the summons to
the Other House, and his proper place was _here!_ With some
hesitation, he was duly sworn, and so was added to the group of
Anti-Oliverian le