Oliver Cromwell and the Rule of the Puritans in England

by C. H. Firth

“Ascend three thrones, great captain and divine,

I’ th’ will of God, old Lion, they are thine.”

Cromwell’s own view of his position was that, being Commander-in-chief by Act of Parliament, his commission made him the only constituted authority left standing. His desire was to put an end to this dictatorship as soon as he could. The sword must be divested of all power in the civil administration, and the army leaders must prove to the world that they had not turned out the Long Parliament in order to grasp at power themselves. The army itself accepted Cromwell’s view, but on the nature of the new civil authority to be set up there were two views amongst the officers. For the present, a temporary Council of State, consisting of thirteen persons, most of whom were officers, carried on the daily business of administration.

As to the future, Major-General Lambert advocated one kind of government, and Major-General Harrison another. Lambert was a gentleman of good family, with some political aptitude and some constitutional knowledge, but less of either than he fancied. A dashing leader and a skilful tactician, he was popular because of his gallant bearing and his genial temper, and believed to be honest because he was good-natured. As a politician he was an intriguer, inscrutable, scheming, and insatiably ambitious. Harrison was a man of no birth and little education, bred on perverted prophecies, full of desperate courage and high-flown enthusiasms,—a man born to lead forlorn hopes and die for lost causes, who did both even to the admiration of his enemies. Unselfish in his own aims, he swayed others by his devotion and his zeal. But he was fitter to command the left wing in the battle of Armageddon than to take any part in the government of earthly states.

Lambert wished to entrust power to a small council of ten or twelve. Harrison wished to give it to a larger council of seventy members like the Jewish Sanhedrin. Lambert’s party proposed that the council should be assisted by an elected Parliament, and the authority of both defined by a written constitution. Harrison’s followers wished to dispense with a Parliament altogether. The first adhered to the principles laid down in the Agreement of the People, which they had drawn up four years earlier. The second were inspired by the opinions of the Fifth Monarchy men, and believed that the time had come to realise their hopes. Of the four great monarchies of the world’s history, the Assyrian and the Persian, the Macedonian and the Roman, three had fallen, and the fourth was tottering to its fall. At last, as the prophets had foretold, the monarchy of Christ was to begin, and till He came to reign in person, His saints were to rule for Him. A text which Harrison had often in his mouth was—“The saints shall take the kingdom and possess it.”

JOHN LAMBERT.
(From a painting by Robert Walker, in the National Portrait Gallery.)

When Cromwell dissolved the Long Parliament, he had no definite plan for the future government of England. He was not a Fifth Monarchy man, but he had no faith in paper constitutions. He was convinced that godly men would make the best governors, but he felt that a government somewhat like a Parliament would be most satisfactory to the nation.

The result was a compromise by which a larger and more representative assembly than Harrison had proposed, was called together. In each county the Congregational Churches were asked to nominate suitable persons, and from this list the council of officers selected those it thought fittest. A hundred and forty persons were thus chosen, of whom five represented Scotland, six Ireland, and the rest England. A writ addressed to each person separately, from Oliver Cromwell, Captain-General, recited that he had been nominated by the General with the advice of his council of officers as one of the men to whom the weighty affairs of the Commonwealth were to be entrusted. All were Puritan notables, combining godliness with fidelity to the cause, and described in the writs as “men fearing God and hating covetousness.”

On July 4th, they met at Westminster, and on behalf of the army Cromwell presented them with a deed under his hand and seal, whereby the several persons therein mentioned were constituted the supreme authority. In his opening speech he related the causes which had led to the dissolution of the Long Parliament and their own convocation, adding some advice on the use they were to make of their power. Let them be just and tender to all kinds of Christians, endeavour the promoting of the Gospel, and study to win the support of the nation by their devotion to the public weal. “Convince them that as men fearing God have fought them out of their bondage, so men fearing God do now rule them in the fear of God.” In the war, and in the events which had led to the overthrow of the monarchy, there was “an evident print of providence,” and now the task of government had come to them “by the way of necessity, by the way of the wise providence of God.” “God manifests this to be the day of the power of Christ; having through so much blood, and so much trial as hath been upon these nations, made this to be one of the great issues thereof: to have His people called to the supreme authority.” Let them therefore own their call, for never any body of men had come into the supreme authority in such a way of owning God and being owned by Him.