CHAPTER XIX.
The Scotch army had crossed the Tweed in the month of January, 1644. Isaak Walton had seen them marching along with their pikes, and wearing on their hats this motto, "For the Crown and Covenant of both kingdoms,"[535] but the quiet angler was not able to understand clearly what he beheld. These soldiers proved of far less service to England than was expected. The indiscretion of generals in the field involved regiments in disaster, and political and religious jealousy at an early period sprung up between some English and Scotch commanders. Grounds of difference existed, inasmuch as certain of the southern captains felt little sympathy with the covenanting zeal of their northern allies. Both, however, had begun to find out that the enemy was much stronger than they had at first imagined, and Baillie, in the month of March, 1644, deplored the persistent attachment of the Royalists to Episcopacy and absolute monarchy, and the absence from their consciences of all remorse for their past misdoings. Indeed, he speaks of so much confidence existing at Oxford, that the popular cause was there accounted to have sunk into a hopeless state; and the Scotch presbyter himself complains that the ways of the Parliament were endless and confused, being full of jealousy, and of other faults. The Independents, he also says, prevented Church matters from being settled as he wished; Antinomians and Anabaptists were on the increase, and, in short, things were altogether in a bad condition.[536]
Long Marston Moor.
The military prospects of the Parliament did not much improve as the spring advanced. The patriots longed for something to be done. The Earl of Manchester was besieging York, and upon the consequence of the expedition in the north, depended the affairs of the Church, scarcely less than the affairs of the State. When, on July the 2nd, 1644, Cromwell and Leslie met Prince Rupert on Long Marston Moor, it was for the purpose of settling an ecclesiastical as well as a political question.
1644, July.
The two armies stood face to face on that memorable spot, eyeing each other for hours, within musket shot,[537] the Parliament horse and foot being ranged along the south side of the moor on rising ground, amidst fields of standing corn, now tall and wet with rain, whilst the King's forces were protected by a deep ditch and hedge in front. When the sun was going down over the wide plain the action commenced. At first it proved in favour of the Royalists, so much so that the Earl of Leven's men fled, and the Scotch might be heard crying, "Waes us, we're a' undone!" Forthwith news of victory flew to Oxford, greeted there by bell-ringing and bonfires, to be only, however, speedily followed by very different tidings; for before midnight Cromwell and Leslie plucked a victory out of the enemy's hands. They charged a brigade of greencoats, and put to the rout the remainder of the Royalist army. The chase was continued to within a mile of the walls of York, the dead bodies, it was said, lying three miles in length, the moon with her light helping somewhat the darkness of the season.[538]
The part which Cromwell took in this fierce battle gave no little triumph to the Independent party, who made the most of the Scotch flight, and hardly did justice to General Leslie.[539] This vexed the Presbyterians, and already the breach between the two assumed a serious appearance.
Naseby.
Though the victory of Marston Moor was of great advantage to the cause of the Parliament, it certainly did not decide the conflict. So far from that being the case, the fortunes of war afterwards favoured the Royalists. In August the Earl of Essex found himself so circumstanced in his western campaign that he suddenly capitulated to the King—an untoward event, which naturally called forth the lamentations of the Westminster Divines.[540] Later still, amongst those persons who were anxious thoroughly to humble their High Church adversaries, and to bring the King to terms of complete submission, there might have been heard complaints to the effect that two summers had passed without the nation being saved; that victories gallantly gotten by the army, and graciously bestowed by Heaven, had been put into a bag with holes; that what was gained one day was lost another, that the summer's victory became a winter tale; and that the whole game had to be played over again. The secret of this want of complete success was said to be the unwillingness of the Presbyterians to crush the Royalists, and their desire for such an accommodation of differences as would place their own ecclesiastical polity close by the side of the English throne. The Independents, therefore, who were loud in making complaints of the description just indicated, seeing as they did that the Presbyterian scheme threatened the extinction of that religious liberty with which their own interests were identified, resolved that there should be a revision of the whole war policy on their own side, and an entire reformation effected in the character and tactics of the army. Out of this determination arose the famous new modelling of the army, and the self-denying ordinance. These changes were accomplished in the winter of 1644, and the re-organized forces, under Fairfax and Cromwell, were ready to take the field by the spring of 1645. When all this had been accomplished, hopes revived, but the siege and capture of Leicester by the Royalists, at the end of May, inspired new fears.[541] These, however, were not of long continuance, and were wholly dissipated by the memorable battle in the month of June.
1645, June.
On Saturday, the 14th, in the afternoon, the lines of the new-modelled army were drawn across certain fallow fields in front of the village of Naseby, whose trim hedges, numerous trees, and solitary windmill are quaintly depicted in an old wood engraving inserted in Sprigg's history of the battle; whilst in the open country, in front of the Parliament troops, the King's forces were stretched out in full array. As at Marston Moor, so now at Naseby, victory at first seemed to wait upon Prince Rupert; but he, ever hot-headed, lost his advantage by pursuing the enemy too far, and came back to find the tide of battle turned against him. There had been, during his absence, desperate charges amidst the furze of the rabbit warren, and the swords and pistols of the Ironsides had proved too much for the well-mounted cavaliers.[542] This engagement proved decisive beyond question, and its place in the history of the Civil Wars is most conspicuous, resembling in this respect the locality where the battle was fought. As Dr. Arnold observes: "On some of the highest table land in England, the streams falling on one side into the Atlantic, on the other into the German Ocean; far away too from any town, Market Harborough the nearest, into which the cavaliers were chased late in the long summer's evening."
Naseby.
1645.
Fast as a horse could gallop, the news was carried up to London, and there for days the talk ran on the standards, the field pieces, the much powder and shot, and the royal coach and baggage, with cabinets and letters, which had been seized by the conquerors.[543] The surrender of Leicester to the Parliament resulted from this victory, and as a further consequence came the second relief of Taunton.[544] That town was held on behalf of the Parliament by Robert Blake—the man who said, when the enemy strove to starve him out, that he had not eaten his boots yet, and who had shewn throughout the siege a patience which was equalled only by his courage. The remembrance continued fresh amongst the Taunton people of the Puritan minister's sermon, preached in the grand old church of St. Mary, on the words, "I am the Lord, I change not: therefore ye sons of Jacob are not consumed;"—and of the shouts of "deliverance!" "deliverance!" which rang through the edifice before the sermon was finished, and which echoed from street to street as Welden's squadron of horse dashed through the east gate to the market-place;—nor could any forget the pause which followed in the church after the tidings had been heard, when all the congregation knelt down and thanked God for their deliverance. And now, again, the faith of the inhabitants was rewarded by the arrival of most timely succour; for the battle of Naseby set Fairfax free to turn his forces southward, and to scatter the forces of Goring, who had been such a pest to the county of Somerset. Not only was Taunton effectually delivered; but Bristol, Bridgewater, Ilchester, and Langport fell into the hands of the Parliament.
Sufferings of the Clergy.
As the war proceeded, and as blustering Cavaliers galloped over the country, singing ribald songs and plundering their neighbours; and as Roundheads, equally stern and demure, marched up and down, singing psalms and sacking the houses of Royalist malignants, it necessarily happened that the clergy were great sufferers in the confusion, for they were required to take a side, wherever the soldiers of either army came. Those who went not up "to the help of the Lord, to the help of the Lord against the mighty," fell under a Puritan malediction, very much like that which was imprecated on Meroz. On the other hand, such as held back from fighting the battle of their King, were treated by Royalists as rebellious scoundrels. Between the two, little peace fell to the lot of country ministers where the torch of war happened to be kindled. And, indeed, such were the issues at stake, and so inextricably were religious questions interwoven with political ones, that it seemed next to impossible for any man whose views were not hemmed in by the boundaries of his own little parish, not to take part in the far-spreading and momentous strife.
1645.
The Puritan who espoused the side of Parliament laid himself open to the violence of Royalists. They would attack his house, break open his chests and cupboards, take away his little stock of plate, cut the curtains from his bed, and steal his linen, even to the pillow-cases. Patience, under such circumstances, became a sign of holy confessorship, and it was told long afterwards with admiration—akin to that of a Catholic repeating the legend of a saint—how a good man so treated, exclaimed with Job, "The Lord gave, and the Lord hath taken away; blessed be the name of the Lord."[545] If a clergyman or chaplain happened to be discovered as a refugee in any castle or in any camp, he would of course be seized as a prisoner of war; and a story is told of one such, who was sentenced to be hanged unless he would ask pardon of the King; which, if he did, he should have not only his life, but a good church-living; whereupon, conscious of his integrity in the part he had taken, the stout-hearted man replied—"To ask pardon, when I am not conscious of any offence, were but the part of a fool, and to betray my conscience in hope of preferment, were but the part of a knave; and if I had neither hope of heaven, nor fear of hell, I would rather die an honest man, than live a fool or knave." It was hard to crush or to ensnare any one who was made of this kind of mettle; and this person, whose name was Balsom, after being delivered from the halter, went on preaching to the Royalist garrison, declaring—"While I have a tongue to speak and people to hear, I will not hold my peace."[546]
Sufferings of the Clergy.
But all Puritans did not adopt the political cause of the Parliament. Some, though incensed at the conduct of Archbishop Laud, still clung to the fortunes of King Charles. They would never wear a surplice, they would never make the sign of the cross; but at any time they would cheerfully die for their sovereign and their country. Such individuals suffered from the Parliament army almost as much as their brethren did from the Royalists. The Rector of Okerton,[547] whose reverence for the Crown was equalled by his dislike to ceremonialism, was four times pillaged by troops of Roundheads, was twice sent to prison, and was reduced to such straits that he had to borrow a shirt.[548] Cases also occurred in which ministers disapproved of an appeal to arms altogether. A clergyman, who would not keep any days of public fasting and thanksgiving—because, as he said, he would not give thanks to God for one man killing another—was persecuted on that account, and was sent to prison by the governor of Boston for keeping a conventicle. So all drank of the sorrow-cup by turns; it being handed sometimes by one man to another, when both of them were alike Puritans. Walker has collected numerous instances of hardship suffered by the Royalist clergy during the wars. A distinction is to be made between the extravagant statements and vituperative remarks in the first part of his most uncharitable book, and such anecdotes as are related on the authority of correspondents in the second part. These latter partake of a legendary character, and are doubtless coloured highly by their authors; but there is no reason why we should discredit them altogether; and it is very interesting and instinctive to compare them with the traditions of confessorship on the Nonconformist side. Mikepher Alphery, rector of Woolley, in Huntingdonshire, was pulled out of his pulpit by a file of musketeers, and lived for a week in a booth under the trees of his churchyard; Lewis Alcock, rector of North-Stoneham—who seems to have been a "muscular Christian"—when threatened by the Parliament soldiers, brought his bed down into the parlour, and with his gun charged, resolved not to give up his parsonage except with his life. Eldard Alvey, of Newcastle, had to relinquish everything he possessed, and to provide for the safety of himself, wife, and seven children, in the night time, whilst his two curates were threatened with a pistol-shot, if they did not give up reading prayers. Daniel Berry concealed himself under a pile of faggots, where his pursuers discovered him by thrusting their swords into the heap.[549] Other similar cases might be mentioned.
Sufferings of the Clergy.
1645.
The largest amount of suffering experienced by the clergy belongs to the period when men's passions were exasperated by war. Soldiers on both sides were the ministers of vengeance. The fiery excitement kindled in the battle-field was carried into peaceful homes, which became identified with the camp; and ministers of religion, pious, faithful, and devoted, might be found, who, if they did not privately prompt, failed publicly to disapprove of the persecution of their brethren. In many of the biographical sketches supplied by Walker, no indications of spiritual religion appear on the part of those whose livings were sequestered. By some, too, as is evident from the instance just cited, the most determined resistance was offered to their persecutors. The spirit of the High Churchman during the civil wars comes out occasionally in strong contrast with that of the Puritan after the Restoration. Yet we cannot doubt but that on the Anglican as well as on the Puritan side there were sufferers, who bore their Master's cross; that for His sake, from loyalty to what they conscientiously regarded as His truth, they bravely endured reproach and wrong. It is amongst the mysteries of Divine Providence, that holy men in this life have to suffer sometimes in a cause which, although by themselves accounted good, is by brethren, equally honest, branded as evil; and that thus there comes to be, in ecclesiastical conflicts, so much pain, at once conscientiously inflicted, and conscientiously endured. No calm thinker can fail to discern the anomaly; and no loving heart but must long for that blessed future, when the fruits of such strange discipline will be reaped by souls now divided on earth, but who will then be united in Heaven amidst the purest charity and the humblest joy.
Only ignorance of the history of those times can lead any one to suppose that the main ecclesiastical questions at issue were settled entirely, or even chiefly by the debates of either divines or of statesmen. What occurred far away from the Jerusalem Chamber, and from St. Stephen's Chapel, had much to do with the proceedings within those walls. Naseby fight struck the last blow in the struggle with Episcopacy, and by crushing the Royalist party, rendered the cause hopeless; and it also, though in a less obvious manner, materially affected the fortunes of Presbyterianism, by controlling its excesses, and preventing the concession of its inordinate demands.
