a power for the sovereign to raise payments | ordinary learning and power on the part of St. for land forces, and consequently submits to John, till then almost unknown in the courts, his wisdom and ordinance the transporting of and a scarcely less remarkable exhibition of the money or men into foreign states, so to venal prostitution of research on the part of the earry, by way of prevention, the fire from our- crown lawyers, judgment was pronounced in selves into the dwellings of our enemies (an favour of ship-money, and against the ilsart which Edward III. and Henry V. well un- trious defendant, by nine out of the twelve derstood); and if, by degrees, Scotland and judges. Of the three dissentients - Hutton,* Ireland be drawn to contribute their propor- Croke, and Denham-Croke would also have tions to these levies for the public, omne tulit given judgment for the crown, had not his wife, punctum. Well fortified," Wentworth contin- a lady of eminent piety and a truly heroic spirued, "this piece forever vindicates the royalty it, sustained his sinking virtue. "She told at home from under the conditions and re- him," says Whitelocke," she hoped he would straints of subjects, and renders us also, abroad, do nothing against his conscience, for fear of even to the greatest kings, the most considera- any danger or prejudice to her or his family; ble monarchy in Christendom.”* Stimulated and that she would be contented to suffer want, thus, the court partially extended their views or any misery with him, rather than be the octhat way, and, advancing gradually from the casion for him to do or say anything against maritime districts, levied the hated tax upon his judgment or conscience." almost every man in England. "For home news," Garrard writes in one of his subsequent letters, "the shipping business goes on currently all over England, so 'tis apprehended at court. Some petitions have been offered to the king from poor towns, which he hath referred to his council." Again: "The Londoners have not been so forward in collecting the ship-money, since they have been taught to sing Hey-down-derry, and many of them will not pay till after imprisonment, that it may stand upon record they were forced to it. The assessments have been wonderful unequal and unproportionable, which is very ill taken, it being conceived they did it on purpose to raise clamour through the city." And again, he writes, "Your lordship is very right, that there is no reason all public works should be put upon the crown. And yet you see how unwilling the people are to contribute to any, be it never so honourable or necessary for themselves. Witness the ship-money, which at this very present ending of the term is under argu-ed a long and curious letter to him, exculpatory of the honment in the Exchequer chamber before all the judges, brought thither upon a case of Mr. Hambden's, as I think; but I am sure, either upon a case of his or the Lord Say's. So have you the greatest news of the time." Lord Clarendon observes that this decision "proved of more advantage and credit to the gentleman condemned than to the king's service. Men before," he adds, "pleased themselves with doing somewhat for the king's service, as a testimony of their affection, which they were not bound to do;t many really believing the necessity, and therefore thinking the burden reasonable. But when they heard this demanded in a court of law as a right, and found it, by sworn judges of the law, adjudged so, upon such grounds and reasons as every stander-by was able to swear was not law, and so had lost the pleasure and delight of being kind and dutiful to the king; and instead of giving were required to pay, and by a logic that left no man anything which he might call his own; when they saw in a court of law (that law that gave them title to, and possession of, all that they had) reasons of state urged as elements of law, judges as sharpsighted as secretaries of state, and in Hutton was a friend of Lord Wentworth's, and addressest course he pursued on this question. I subjoin a char acteristic extract from the lord-deputy's reply: "Conpublic danger and necessity such a levy may be made, and sidering it is agreed by common consent that in time of that the king is therein sole judge how or in what manner or proportion it is to be gathered, I conceive it was out of ject, and that reverence wherein we ought to have so grahumour opposed by Hambden, beyond the modesty of a subcious a sovereign; it being ever to be understood, the prospects of kings into mysteries of state are so far exceeding those of ordinary common persons, as they be able to discern and prevent dangers to the public afar off, which others shall not so much as dream of till they feel the unavoidable stripes and smart of them upon their naked shoulders; besides, the mischief which threatens states and people are not always those which become the object of every vulgar eye, but then commonly of most danger when least discov Great news this was indeed! Many men had resisted ship-money; many poor men had been flung into prison for refusing to pay it, and lay there languishing and unknown; many rich men had vainly stirred themselves against it; but at last, in the person of Hampden, the popular party prepared to make their final and resolved resistance, and in his great name all the renown of that resistance has been absorbed.‡ered-nay, very often, if unseasonably over early published, Pym and St. John were Hampden's close counsellors in the interval before the public trial, and six months were passed in preparations on both sides. At last, after a display of extra * Strafford Papers, vol. ii., p. 61, 62. t Ibid., vol. i., p. 468. It may be observed, at the same time, that doubtless the court party were to be consulted as to the choice of a person in whose case the right of resistance was to be decided, since up to this period, when refusers of ship-money had gone before the courts, the judges on circuit had overruled, or declined to entertain, any plea founded on the assumed illegality of the imposition, and thus the question of right had remained undecided. Unable, however, to resist any longer the demand for a settlement of the question, it is probable that the king's party thought that, in its progress, the "affability and temper" of Hampden as an opponent would serve them best. It is certain that Lord Say and Sele was distinctly refused a trial. albeit privately known to the king long before, might rather us all, in the fear of God, to remit these supreme watches inflame than remedy the evil; therefore it is a safe rule for to that regal power, whose peculiar indeed it is; submit ourselves in these high considerations to his ordinance, as being no other than the ordinance of God itself; and rather attend upon his will, with confidence in his justice, belief in his wisdom, assurance in his parental affections to his subjects and kingdoms, than feed ourselves with the curious questions, with the vain flatteries of imaginary liberty, which, had we even our silly wishes and conceits, were we to frame a new Commonwealth even to our own fancy, might yet, in conclusion, leave ourselves less free, less hap py than now, thanks be to God and his majesty, we are, nay, ought justly to be, reputed by every moderate-minded + Memorials, p. 25. Christian." But they were, before the decision, bound to obey the tax, and that by sharper conditions than attended any other levy. These and other expressions of Lord Clarendon in the extract are artful misrepresentations, easily seen through: the extract is very valuable evidence, notwithstanding. the mysteries of state, judgment of law ground- | recall the horror and disgust with which their ed upon matter of fact, of which there was nei- sufferings have passed into history. The very ther inquiry nor proof, and no reasons given for name of toleration was banished from England. the tax in question but what included the A refusal to attend divine worship in the parestates of all the standers-by, they no more ish church was, in all persons, without exceplooked upon it as the case of one man, but the tion, punished in the first instance by fine, and case of the kingdom, nor as an imposition laid on a repetition of such refusal by transportaupon them by the king, but by the judges, which tion. Popish recusants, indeed, were allowed they thought themselves bound in conscience to compound for these penalties by a heavy anto the public justice not to submit to." In oth-nual payment; and the celebration of mass, er words, the event justified the policy of the though illegal, was connived at; but no similar leaders of the people, and they now quietly re-indulgence was extended to the religious sersumed their former position, hopeful and determined. Laud soon wrote to Wentworth that the "faction are grown very bold, and the king's moneys come in a great deal more slowly than they did in former years, and that to a very considerable sum ;" and Whitelocke closes his description of the proceedings with these words: " Hampden and many others of quality and interest in their counties were unsatisfied with the judgment, and continued, with the utmost of their power, in opposition to it, yet could not at that time give any other stop or hinderance; but it remained alta mente repôstum." vices of Protestant dissenters. The dissenting ministers, in point of fact, did not yet form a distinct class; they were, with very rare exceptions, ordained and beneficed clergy of the English Church; and being thus lawfully subject to the authority of their diocesan, the means of detecting and punishing their deviations from conformity were easy and obvious. Accordingly, from Laud they found no quarter. At the thought of every episcopal visitation the clergy groaned and trembled. Lecturers were peremptorily s lenced; domestic chaplains in the houses of private gentlemen punished, and their patrons ordered to attend their parish' churches; while the parochial clergy, where non-conformable, were fined, suspended, in some cases deprived, and ultimately, in very many instances, driven out of England with the more zealous of their followers, happy to escape without some mutilation of their persons, for scarcely a sitting of the Star Chamber passed without its victim, and its consequent exhibition, in the public streets, of some scene Leaving it thus, for a time, in the minds of Pym and Hampden, it is now necessary-in completion of such a sketch of the present government of England as will be thought essential to a right judgment of the exertions of Pym's latter life-that I should slightly revert to Laud's administration of religious affairs. It was frightfully consistent with the view that has been furnished of the condition of civil matters. The barbarous punishment of Leigh-of bloody human agony! On one occasion, ton, the Scotch divine; the cruel persecution of Balmerino at Edinburgh; the shocking severities that were practised upon Prynne, Burton, and Bastwick, need only be alluded to to Strafford Papers, vol. ii., p. 170. + See Rushworth, vol. ii., p. 55; Whitelocke, p. 15; Neal, vol. i., p. 547; and see Laud's Diary for November 16, 1630. See Carte, vol. iv., p. 222. State Trials, vol. iii., &c. See Laud's Diary; Neal's History of the Puritans; Rushworth, vol. ii., p. 220, et seq. Heylin's Life of Laud, 249, &c. Garrard writes to Lord Wentworth: "Some few days after the end of the term, in the palace-yard two pillories were erected, and there the sentence of Star Chamber against Burton, Bastwick, and Prynne was executed: they stood two hours in the pillory; Burton by himself, being degraded in the High Commission Court three days before. The place was full of people, who cried and howled terribly, especially when Burton was cropt. Dr. Bastwick was very merry his wife, Dr. Poe's daughter, got a stool, and kissed him; his ears being cut off, she called for them, and put them in a clean handkerchief, and carried them away with her. Bastwick told the people, the lords had collar-days at court, but this was his collar-day, rejoycing much in it. Since, warrants are sent from the lords to the sheriffs of the several counties where they are to be imprisoned, to receive them and see them placed. Also Dr. Layton, homo ejusdem farinde, censured seven years since, and now prisoner in the Fleet, is removed to some remote prison of the kingdom." From that prison Leighton was not released till ten years after, when he had lost sight, hearing, and the use of his limbs! Another of the lord deputy's correspondents had before described the mutilation of Prynne: "No mercy showed to Prynne: he stood in the pillory, and lost his first ear in a pillory in the pal ace at Westminster in full term, his other in Cheapside; where, while he stood, his volumes were burned under his nose, which had almost suffocated him." Lastly, Laud himself wrote thus to Wentworth: "I have done expecting of thorow on this side, and therefore shall betake myself to that which you say, and I believe, is the next best; and yet I would not give over neither. But what can you think of thorow where there shall be such slips in business of consequence? What say you to it that Prynne and his followers should be suffered to talk what they pleased while Lilburne and Wharton, after having suffered a severe whipping, were standing exposed in the pillory, news was carried to the Star Chamber that Wharton, unsilenced by his suffering or his shame, was scattering pamphlets about and haranguing the mob; and the court, happening to be sitting at the moment, made an order that he should be gagged, and the order was executed instantly! Prynne, having had his old ears stitched to his head, "relapsed," as Garrard expresses it, "into new errors," and again suffered a mutilation of the fragments! Meanwhile, the language of Wentworth and Laud held out no hope of change. "Go it as it shall please God with me," wrote Wentworth, "believe me, my lord, I will be still thorough and thoroughout, one and the same.* The cure of this grievous and over-spreading leprosy is, in my weak judgment, to be effected rather by corrosives than lenitives; less than thorough will not overcome it: there is a cancerous malignity in it, which must be cut forth!" What wonder if, in the midst of all this fright- while they stood in the pillory, and win acclamations from indeed now seemed to many persons to remain: | fact, there is no reason for supposing that all that, as May expresses it,*"Things carried so who had embarked for New England on board far on in a wrong way must needs either en- the eight ships alluded to did not proceed to slave themselves and posterity forever, or re- New England. No doubt they did so. quire a vindication so sharp and smarting as that the nation would groan under it." Too weak to contemplate the last alternative, and too virtuous to submit to the first, crowds of victimst to the tyranny of Church and State now accordingly left their homes and their country, willing to encounter any sufferings, privations, and dangers in the distant wilderness they sought, because of the one sole hope they had, that there, at least, would be found some rest and refuge for liberty, for religion, for humanity! So extensive, however, did the emigration threaten to become, that Laud thought it necessary to interfere at last, and-with a refinement of tyranny of which, it has been truly said, the annals of persecution afford few equally strong examples-to seek to deprive the conscientious sufferers of that last and most melancholy of all resources, a rude, and distant, and perpetual exile. On the 1st of May, 1638, eight ships bound for New England, and filled with Puritan families, were arrested in the Thames by an order in council. It has been a very popular "rumour of history," that among the passengers in one of those vessels were Pym, Hampden, Cromwell, and Hazelrig. The anecdote in question, however, is not without ground of a certain kind. Some years before its date, the attention of the leading men among the patriots had been strongly directed to the subject of the colonization of part of the North American Continent, with a view to its affording a refuge of safety and comfort to such of their party or their families as the sad troubles which impended over England might force from their homes. The subject had occupied even Eliot's thoughts in his prison, as a passage from one of Hampden's letters to him may serve to show. "The paper of considerations concerning the Plantation might be very safely conveyed to me by this hand, and after transcribing, should be as safely returned, if you vouchsafe to send it to me."* The result of all this consideration of the subject was the purchase of a large grant of land in the name of Lord Brook, and Lord Say and Sele; and in 1635, according to Horace Walpole, these two lords "sent over Mr. George Fenwick to prepare a retreat for them and their friends, in consequence of which a little town was built, and called by their joint names Saybrooke."+ Now in this scheme there can be little doubt that Hampden was concerned; and I have found certain evidence, in Garrard's letters to Lord Strafford, that Pym was a party to it. "Our East India Company," writes that indefatigable newsmonger, "have this week two ships come home, which a little revives them. The traders also into the Isle of Providence, who are the Earl of Warwick, the Lord Say, the Lord Mandeville, the Lord Brook, Sir Benjamin Rudyard, Mr. Pym, and others, have ta Were this anecdote authentic, the hand of fate had been visible upon Charles indeed! But there is no good authority‡ for it, and it is deficient in all the moral evidences of truth. The mind cannot bring itself to imagine the spirits of such men as these yielding so easily to the despair of country; and at this moment Hampden was the "argument of all tongues" for his resistance to ship-money, while to Pym the vision of the fatal meeting to which he had sum-ken a prize, sent home worth £15,000 by virmoned Wentworth now became daily more and more distinct. Nor are we wanting of absolute circumstances of proof, obvious enough to me, of the utter incorrectness of the statement. In the same part of Rushworth's Collections where the original order is to be found, a subsequent proclamation may be seen also, wherein, after stating the seizure of the ships, the following passage occurs: "Howbeit, upon the humble petition of the merchants, passengers, and owners of the ships now bound for New England, and upon the reasons by them represented to the board, his majesty was graciously pleased to free them from their late restraint, to proeeed in their intended voyage." So that, in History of the Long Parliament, p. 17. + The plantations of Ormond and Clare," writes Laud to Wentworth at this time, "are a marvellous great work for the honour and profit of the king and safety of that kingdom, and you have done very nobly to follow that business cose; but I am sorry to read in your letters that you want men extremely to fill that work; and this is the more conderable a great deal, that you should want men in Ireland, and that, the while, there should be here such a universal running to New England, and God knows whither; but this it is, when men think nothing is their advantage but to run from government. As for your being left alone in the envious and thorny part of the work, that is no news at least to me, who am forced to the like here, scarce a man appearing where the way is rough indeed." The only known authorities are Dr. George Bates and Daziale, both zealous Royalists, and, on this point, quite be aeath consideration. 4 See Rushworth, vol. ii., p. 409, and see Aikin's Charles, FOL. 1, p. 473. tue of letters of marque granted to the planters there by his majesty for some injuries done them by the Spaniard."* The date of this letter is December, 1637; and from that date, as the prospects of the court darkened, the hopes of Pym and Hampden must have grown with the passage of every day. Time and fate soon pressed in hard, indeed, upon the government of Charles. Driven to the close of every expedient, his last hope centred in the Lord-deputy of Ireland, and Wentworth's capacity and vigour had now twice restored the court finances and paid the king's debts. Ruin again impended, when Laud, as if to dash at once into the gulf, made a desperate attempt to impose the yoke of the Common Prayer Book upon the Scotch people. A fool might have seen the result, and indeed one fool did see it, and was whipped for his folly. I do not know that it has been remarked before, but the disgrace of the famous Archy, the jester of Charles I., took place at this time. "Archy is fallen into a great misfortune," writes a letter of the time. "A fool he would be, but a foul-mouthed knave he hath proved himself; being in a tavern in Westminster, drunk, he saith himself, he was speaking of the Scottish Eliot MSS. in Lord Eliot's possession. † See Walpole's Catalogue of Royal and Noble Authors, vol. ii., p. 352, ed. Park. 4 Strafford Papers, vol. ii., p. 140. business, he fell a railing on my Lord of Canter- | members of the Commons than had ever been bury, said he was a monk, a rogue, and a traitor. Of this his grace complained at council, the king being present: it was ordered he should be carried to the porter's lodge, his coat pulled over his ears, and kicked out of the court, never to enter within the gates, and to be called into the Star Chamber. The first part is done, but my Lord of Canterbury hath interceded to the king that there it should end. There is a new fool in his place, Muckle John, but he will never be so rich, for he cannot abide money." This last must have seemed a fool indeed! The affairs of Scotland belong to general history, and require only a brief mention here. Suffice it, then, to say, that after several months' alternation of persecution and negotiations, the Scottish people remained firm. Most truly has it been said of the conduct of the Covenanters, that the display they now made of fearless purpose, and even of fearless reason; of unwearied, unwinking energy and sagacity; of ardour without violence, and enthusiasm without extravagance, has done imperishable honour to the Scottish character. Why should it be denied that Pym, Hampden, and others of the English opposition placed themselves immediately in communication with those men? It stands upon the authority of Whitelocke, and may not be denied. With the dawning of the fierce opposition in Scotland to the frightful tyranny of conscience attempted by Laud, sprang up the consummation of the hopes entertained during twelve long years of oppression by Pym and Hampden, that a day for the liberties of England would still come. Let the friends of Charles I. make what use of the admission they please, it is quite certain that at the London meetings of the Scotch commissioners from the Covenant, headed by Lords Loudon and Dumferling, not only Pym and Hampden took an active part, but also Lords Essex, Holland, Bedford, and Say. He known to assemble on the first day of the session. His speech was equally short and ungracious. 'My lords and gentlemen," he said, "there never was a king that had a more great and weighty cause to call his people together than myself: I will not trouble you with the particulars. I have informed my lord-keeper, and command him to speak, and desire your attention."* The lord-keeper's speech was in the absurdest strain of high prerogative. observed that "his majesty's kingly resolutions were seated in the ark of his sacred breast, and it were a presumption of too high a nature for any Uzzah uncalled to touch it; yet," he continued, "the king is now pleased to lay by the shining beams of majesty, as Phoebus did to Phaeton, that the distance between sovereignty and subjection should not bar you from that filial freedom of access to his person and councils; only let us beware how, like the son of Clymene, we aim not at the guiding of the chariot." He proceeded subsequently to say, "that his majesty did not expect advice from them, much less that they should interpose in any office of mediation, which would not be grateful to him; but that they should, as soon as might be, give his majesty a supply, and that he would give them time enough afterward to represent any grievances to him."t "The House," proceeds Lord Clarendon, who on this occasion made his first entrance into the House of Commons as Edward Hyde, member for the borough of Wootton-Basset, "met always at eight of the clock, and rose at twelve, which were the old Parliament hours, that the committees, upon whom the greatest burden of business lay, might have the afternoons for their preparation and despatch. It was not the custom to enter upon any important business during the first fortnight, both because many members used to be absent so long, and that time was usually thought necesMeanwhile Lord Wentworth stood by the sary for the appointment and nomination of side of Charles in England, and a war was re- committees, and for other ceremonies and solved upon against the Scottish people. The preparations that were usual; but there was lord-deputy's unparalleled exertions at this pe- no regard now to that custom; and the apriod have been already described,* but the si-pearance of the members was very great, there lent efforts of Pym and Hampden flung them powerless back, and all the attempts at loans and ship-money levies now fell flat to the ground. The strong spirit of hope was in truth again gone forth among all classes of men, and that word which had been proscribed by Charles twelve years before, was again heard as a familiar word in England. A Parliament, it was resolved, should be instantly summoned. Wentworth was created Lord Strafford; returned to Ireland as lordlieutenant; called a Parliament there; procured a large sum of money from them, with a farther offer of "their persons and estates," if required; and in the beginning of April returned to England. The example of the Irish Parliament would, it was vainly hoped, influence the Parliament of England. Meanwhile, the elections for members had been concluded without a single demonstration of tumult in any part of the country; and on the 3d of April, 1640, the king opened the houses in person, and in the midst of a larger number of *See Life of Strafford, p. 117. having been a large time between the issuing out of the writs and the meeting of the Parliament, so that all elections were made and returned, and everybody was willing to fall to the work.”‡ A leader only was wanting; and in this great position, by the common consent of all, Pym now placed himself. As he looked round the seats, crowded as they were with members, what gaps must have appeared in them to him! The line of his early friends and associates was broken indeed. "The long intermission of Parliament," observes Clarendon, "had worn out most of those who had been acquainted with the rules and orders observed in those conventions." Sir Edward Coke and Sir Robert Philips were dead now, and Sir John Eliot * Rushworth, vol. iii. (part second), p. 1114. Rushworth was appointed, this session, clerk-assistant to the House of Commons. + See Clarendon, vol. i., p. 233. Clarendon's History, vol. i., p. 233–234. "Sir Robert Philips," wrote Garrard to the lord-depaty on the 10th of May, 1638, "Sir Robert Philips, your old acquaintance, has died of a cold-choked with phlegm."Strafford Papers, vol. ii., p. 164. Pym, a grave and religious gentleman, in a long speech of almost two hours, recited a catalogue of the grievances which at that time lay heavy on the Commonwealth, of which many abbreviated copies, as extracting the heads only, were with great greediness taken by gentlemen, and others throughout the kingdom, for it was not then in fashion to print speeches of Parliament." had perished in his prison. But it was a greatgal proclamations which had been published, and redeeming consolation to Pym that Hamp- and the proceedings which had been upon those den still sat by his side, and that up to the close proclamations; the judgment upon ship-money, of their illustrious career the most intimate and many grievances which related to the ecprivate friendship henceforth united them even clesiastical jurisdiction; summing up shortly more closely, if that were possible, than the and sharply all that most reflected upon the great public objects they pursued in common. prudence and justice of the government, and Hitherto Hampden had been "rather of reputa- concluding 'that he had only laid that scheme tion in his own country than of public discourse before them that they might see how much work or fame in the kingdom;" but the business of they had to do to satisfy their country, the method ship-money had made him the argument of all and manner of the doing whereof he left to tongues; and to the toils and perils of public their wisdoms."" To this may be added the life he now, by Pym's side, entirely devoted characteristic description given by May, the himself. He brought up all his family to Lon-historian of the Long Parliament: "Master don from their seat in Buckinghamshire, which only at a few chance intervals he ever saw again; and it is an additional proof of the close intimacy I speak of, that henceforward they lived in lodgings near Pym's house,* which was then in Gray's Inn Lane, until the commencement of the following Parliament, when Pym having changed his residence to Westminster, Hampden removed there also. Before the meeting of the present Parliament, I should also mention, they had ridden together through several of the English counties, less with the view, as Anthony à Wood states, of "promoting elections of the Puritanical brethren," than of urging the people to meet and send petitions to the House of Commons as soon as possible after it had assembled. Petitioning Parliament was first organized thus, as a system, by Pym and Hampden. The result was sensibly felt the day after the delivery of the king's speech, when several county members rose and presented petitions from their respective counties, complaining of ship-money projects and monopolies, the Star Chamber and High Commission courts, and other heavy grievances. Hence-a report which received the subsequent correcthough the king had, at the close of the lord- tion of Pym himself. These extracts are rekeeper's speech the day before, distinctly asked markable on every account: they do not simply of the House that they should proceed at once illustrate the period better than any laboured to the consideration of the Scotch business history can; they will be found to mark, also, with a view to supplies, and for this purpose most emphatically, a certain grave and subdued had specially ordered the lord-keeper's speech style and manner in the speaker, which singuand his own to be entered on the journals-larly contrasts with his tone at the meeting of even the Royalist members of the House could not but recognise, after the presentation of such a series of petitions from the people they represented, a certain sort of "divided duty." This was exactly the occasion Pym had sought, and he availed himself of it. The effect of this speech was so extraordinary throughout England, that it has been made matter of general comment with all the historians of the period. The only reference they are able to give, however, is to the abstract supplied by Rushworth;* and this seemed to me to be so unsatisfactory a version, that I commenced a search among the pamphlets at the British Museum, in the hope that some publication of a speech that had produced such results, and which might possibly have taken place with Pym's authority, had escaped the notice of the indefatigable collector. This hope was not disappointed; and some extensive extracts shall now be laid before the reader, from the Parliament that followed. It is as though he spoke-and doubtless he did speak-with the thorough knowledge that, as the present Parliament had been called by the king, the next was to be forced into existence by the people. The report is given in the third person, and opens thus: "While men gazed upon each other," says Lord Clarendon, "looking who should begin (much the greater part having never before sat in Parliament), Mr. Pym, a man of good reputation, but much better known afterward, who had been as long in those assemblies as any man then living, brake the ice; and in a set discourse of above two hours, after mention of the king with profound reverence, and commendation of his wisdom and justice, he observed, that by the long intermission of Parliaments many unwarrantable things had been practised, notwithstanding the great virtue of his majesty ;' and then enumerated all the projects which had been set on foot; all the ille-best furtherers of his majestie's service. Hee See Lord Nugent's Memorials of Hampden, vol. i., P. "Never Parliament had greater businesses to dispatch, nor more difficulties to encounter ; therefore wee have reason to take all advantages of order and addresse, and hereby wee shall not only doe our owne worke, but dispose and inable ourselves for the better satisfaction of his majestie's desire of supply. The grievances being removed, our affections will carry us with speede and cheerefulnesse, to give his majestie that which may be sufficient both for his honour and support. Those that in the very first place shall endeavour to redresse the grievances, will be found not to hinder, but to bee the 296. † See Clarendon's Life. : Rushworth, vol. iii., p. 1131. Whitelocke thus describes him: "Master Pym, an ancient gentleman of great experience in Parliamentary affars, and no less known fidelity to his country." motion as he that addeth wings. Divers pieces that takes away weights doth as much advantage of this maine worke have beene already propounded; his endeavour should be to present Vol. iii., p. 1131. Old. Parl. Hist., vol. viii., p. 425. |