The commotion at Westminster was intense; never, even at the arrest of Sir John Eliot or at the impeachment of the Earl of Strafford, or at the passing of the Great Remonstrance, had excitement run so high.
For the King, without acquainting his new advisers, in direct violation of his recent promises, to the astonishment and dismay of his friends, the rage and horror of his enemies, had made a move which put his legal position in the wrong and showed at once and for ever that alliance between him and the popular party was impossible. He had sent the Attorney-General to the Bar of the House of Lords to impeach Lord Kimbolton and five members of the Lower Chamber—Pym, Strode, Holles, Haselrig, and Hampden.
Immediately afterwards a guard was sent from Whitehall to arrest the five members. The Commons refused to deliver them, and sent a message to the King to say that the gentlemen charged were ready to answer any legal accusation. They also ordered the arrest of the officers who had been sent to search the rooms of the five members and seize and seal up their papers.
This was the answer of the House to the challenge cast down by the King, and all England thrilled to it; all England waited too, in a kind of passionate suspense, the answer that would come from Whitehall. Was the King, who had so suddenly declared himself an enemy of the nation, baffled, checked or only further enraged? What would he do next?
Few slept that night of the 3rd of January; and from thousands of Puritan households prayers and lamentations ascended.
It was now clear that not by gentle means could the people of England hope to regain their cherished liberty, and that neither consideration nor fair dealing was to be hoped from a King who had so contemptuously disregarded faith and the law.
Falkland, Culpeper, Hyde, and their following were utterly confounded and dismayed, ashamed and humiliated, but in the stern hearts of Pym, Hampden, Holles, Haselrig, Strode, and Cromwell was a certain exultation.
Their enemy (for so by now these men had come to regard the King) had put himself in the wrong, and alienated that vast mass of the nation which in all great crises long remains neutral, and which had, hitherto, declared for neither King nor Parliament.
But the recent action of the King, after his open promise before Parliament, caused the least reflective and humble of men to entertain a jealousy of their liberties, and a strong murmur of indignation arose over the whole country, which was a good help and encouragement to these men at Westminster.
Added to this satisfaction, the popular leaders, who had already dared so much and ventured so far, felt a deep, if stern, gratification, which was not, perhaps, shared by their followers, that affairs were coming at length to a conclusion. Charles had now raised the issue, and it was their task to answer his challenge as decisively as he had given it. Three at least of the Commoners—Pym, Hampden, and Cromwell—did not shrink from the immense responsibilities which this involved on them, nor from the high stakes on which they had to play.