In short, Cromwell’s attitude toward all honest, sincere, “godley” men was the same as his attitude toward George Fox. “Come again to my house,” he said, when dismissing the sturdy Quaker, “for if thou and I were but an hour a day together we should be nearer one to the other. I wish you no more ill than I do to my own soul.”
On November 17th, 1645, “the Dissenting Bretheren,” the representatives of the Independents in the Westminster Assembly, declared for a full liberty of conscience. “They expressed themselves,” as Baillie, the Scotch Presbyterian commissioner, wrote sadly, “for toleration, not only to themselves, but to all sects.” In February of the same year, the Oxford Clergy, who had been consulted by the King as to the limits of possible concession, gave strong evidence that the pressure of events were forcing them to move, even though slowly, in the same direction. (See Gardiner, History of the Civil War, vol. ii. pp. 125-126.)
APPENDIX C
WHAT MAY BE THOSE PARTICULAR LAWS, OR SUCH A METHOD OF LAWS, WHEREBY A COMMONWEALTH MAY BE GOVERNED?
1. The bare letter of the Law established by Act of Parliament shall be the Rule for Officers and People, and the chief Judge of all actions.
2. He or they who add or diminish from the Law, excepting in the Court of Parliament, shall be cashiered his Office, and never bear Office more.
3. No man shall administer the Law for Money or Reward. He that doth shall die as a Traitor to the Commonwealth. For when Money must buy and sell Justice, and bear all the sway, there is nothing but Oppression to be expected.
[Here, as also in other Laws yet to follow, Winstanley, and as it seems to us without sufficient grounds, gives up the position taken up in The New Law of Righteousness, that capital punishment was absolutely unjustifiable.]
4. The Laws shall be read by the Minister to the People four times in the year, viz., every quarter; that everyone may know whereunto they are to yield obedience, that none may die for want of knowledge.
5. No accusation shall be taken against any man unless it be proved by two or three witnesses, or his own confession.