The moment that Cromwell died, his system began to break up; in six months it had disappeared; in eighteen months England once more was ruled by a Stuart king. The Lord Protector had named no successor, but the Council of State took the step of nominating his son Richard to his place, as being the man who would divide parties the least. Richard Cromwell was an easy-going country gentleman, without any of his father's characteristics. He was neither self-confident, nor a soldier, nor a man of fervent religion. When saluted as Protector, he observed that he would never make anything more than a fair chief-constable. He bore himself modestly and discreetly, and proceeded at once to endeavour to put himself right with the nation by calling a Parliament. It met in January, 1659, and was found to contain many concealed Royalists, and many more stiff republicans of the old Presbyterian type, who objected on principle to the protectorship. Such a body was bound to fall into internal quarrels; all parties in it concurred in treating the unfortunate Richard with disregard.
Richard and the army.—He resigns.
But it was not the Parliament which was to upset the new Lord Protector. The army saw that with Oliver's death their old power was gone, for neither Richard nor the two Houses had any sympathy with them. A council of officers met, and resolved to seize control of affairs. They petitioned for the appointment of a general-in-chief who should represent them and act as their leader. When this was refused, a deputation of colonels called on the weak Richard, and hectored him, by threats of violence, into dissolving Parliament (April, 1659). Equally unwilling and unable to become a military autocrat, the Lord Protector immediately after resigned his office, and went off in joy to his quiet country seat of Hursley. He lived there as an obscure squire for more than forty years, and survived till the reign of Queen Anne.
Revival of the "Rump."
England was now without a Protector and without a Parliament, left in the hands of a ring of ambitious and fanatical military men. Looking round for the fittest tool to serve their purposes, the committee of officers resolved on restoring the old "Rump Parliament" which had disappeared so ignominiously six years before. Accordingly, they sought out the Independent members who had once sat in that body, and restored them to Westminster Hall. Forty survivors under Speaker Lenthall took their old places, and claimed to be the governing power of England (May 9).
Quarrels of the military leaders.
Of all the bodies which had ever ruled England, the "Rump" had been the most incapable and the most despised. The whole nation was indignant at seeing its miserable remnant replaced in power. Meanwhile the officers began to fall out with each other: Lambert, Fleetwood, Desborough, had each his party among the soldiery, and aspired to fill Oliver's vacant place. Eight months of anarchy followed; the various generals bullied the Parliament and intrigued against each other. Royalist risings took place in Cheshire and the West. Finally Lambert, the most vigorous of the military men, entered London with his regiments and drove out the Parliament, just as Oliver had done six years before. But Lambert was no Cromwell; he only ruled a fraction of the soldiery, and had no party among the people (October, 1659).
Popular wish for a Restoration.
The divisions of the army had at last broken the formidable military power which had so long repressed the wishes of the nation. Commonwealths and Protectors had been tried in the balance and found wanting. There was a general feeling that the only way out of anarchy was the restoration of the old constitution of England, with King, Lords, and Commons. The majority even of the original Parliamentarians of 1642 were ready to acknowledge that they had done unwisely, in breaking up the foundations of law and order by abolishing the monarchy. Calvinistic fervour had worked itself out; the majority of the old Puritans of the days of Charles I. had come to realize that Levellers, Fifth-monarchy men, and military saints were even more objectionable and impracticable than the Episcopalians whom they had once hated so sorely.
Monk marches to London.