Characters from the Histories & Memoirs of the Seventeenth Century

by Unknown

39.

By RICHARD BAXTER

Never man was highlier extolled, and never man was baselier reported of, and vilified than this man. No (meer) man was better and worse spoken of than he; according as mens Interests led their Judgments. The Soldiers and Sectaries most highly magnified him, till he began to seek the Crown and the Establishment of his Family: And then there were so many that would be Half-Kings themselves, that a King did seem intollerable to them. The Royalists abhorred him as a most perfidious Hypocrite; and the Presbyterians thought him little better, in his management of publick matters.

If after so many others I may speak my Opinion of him, I think, that, having been a Prodigal in his Youth, and afterward changed to a zealous Religiousness, he meant honestly in the main, and was pious and conscionable in the main course of his Life, till Prosperity and Success corrupted him: that, at his first entrance into the Wars, being but a Captain of Horse, he had a special care to get religious men into his Troop: These men were of greater understanding than common Soldiers, and therefore were more apprehensive of the Importance and Consequence of the War; and making not Money, but that which they took for the Publick Felicity, to be their End, they were the more engaged to be valiant; for he that maketh Money his End, doth esteem his Life above his Pay, and therefore is like enough to save it by flight when danger comes, if possibly he can: But he that maketh the Felicity of Church and State his End, esteemeth it above his Life, and therefore will the sooner lay down his Life for it. And men of Parts and Understanding know how to manage their business, and know that flying is the surest way to death, and that standing to it is the likeliest way to escape; there being many usually that fall in flight, for one that falls in valiant fight. These things it's probable Cromwell understood; and that none would be such engaged valiant men as the Religious: But yet I conjecture, that at his first choosing such men into his Troop, it was the very Esteem and Love of Religious men that principally moved him; and the avoiding of those Disorders, Mutinies, Plunderings, and Grievances of the Country, which deboist men in Armies are commonly guilty of: By this means he indeed sped better than he expected. Aires, Desborough, Berry, Evanson, and the rest of that Troop, did prove so valiant, that as far as I could learn, they never once ran away before an Enemy. Hereupon he got a Commission to take some care of the Associated Counties, where he brought his Troop into a double Regiment, of fourteen full Troops; and all these as full of religious men as he could get: These having more than ordinary Wit and Resolution, had more than ordinary Success; first in Lincolnshire, and afterward in the Earl of Manchester's Army at York Fight: With their Successes the Hearts both of Captain and Soldiers secretly rise both in Pride and Expectation: And the familiarity of many honest erroneous Men (Anabaptists, Antinomians, &c.) withal began quickly to corrupt their Judgments. Hereupon Cromwell's general Religious Zeal, giveth away to the power of that Ambition, which still increaseth as his Successes do increase: Both Piety and Ambition concurred in his countenancing of all that he thought Godly of what Sect soever: Piety pleadeth for them as Godly; and Charity as Men; and Ambition secretly telleth him what use he might make of them. He meaneth well in all this at the beginning, and thinketh he doth all for the Safety of the Godly, and the Publick Good, but not without an Eye to himself.

When Successes had broken down all considerable opposition, he was then in the face of his Strongest Temptations, which conquered him when he had conquered others: He thought that he had hitherto done well, both as to the End and Means, and God by the wonderful Blessing of his Providence had owned his endeavours, and it was none but God that had made him great: He thought that if the War was lawful, the Victory was lawful; and if it were lawful to fight against the King and conquer him, it was lawful to use him as a conquered Enemy, and a foolish thing to trust him when they had so provoked him, (whereas indeed the Parliament professed neither to fight against him, nor to conquer him). He thought that the Heart of the King was deep, and that he resolved upon Revenge, and that if he were King, he would easily at one time or other accomplish it; and that it was a dishonest thing of the Parliament to set men to fight for them against the King, and then to lay their Necks upon the block, and be at his Mercy; and that if that must be their Case, it was better to flatter or please him, than to fight against him. He saw that the Scots and the Presbyterians in the Parliament, did by the Covenant and the Oath of Allegiance, find themselves bound to the Person and Family of the King, and that there was no hope of changing their minds in this: Hereupon he joyned with that Party in the Parliament who were for the Cutting off the King, and trusting him no more. And consequently he joyned with them in raising the Independants to make a Fraction in the Synod at Westminster and in the City; and in strengthening the Sectaries in Army, City and Country, and in rendering the Scots and Ministers as odious as he could, to disable them from hindering the Change of Government. In the doing of all this, (which Distrust and Ambition had perswaded him was well done) he thought it lawful to use his Wits, to choose each Instrument, and suit each means, unto its end; and accordingly he daily imployed himself, and modelled the Army, and disbanded all other Garrisons and Forces and Committees, which were like to have hindered his design. And as he went on, though he yet resolved not what form the New Commonwealth should be molded into, yet he thought it but reasonable, that he should be the Chief Person who had been chief in their Deliverance; (For the Lord Fairfax he knew had but the Name). At last, as he thought it lawful to cut off the King, because he thought he was lawfully conquered, so he thought it lawful to fight against the Scots that would set him up, and to pull down the Presbyterian Majority in the Parliament, which would else by restoring him undo all which had cost them so much Blood and Treasure. And accordingly he conquereth Scotland, and pulleth down the Parliament: being the easilier perswaded that all this was lawful, because he had a secret Byas and Eye towards his own Exaltation: For he (and his Officers) thought, that when the King was gone a Government there must be; and that no Man was so fit for it as he himself; as best deserving it, and as having by his Wit and great Interest in the Army, the best sufficiency to manage it: Yea, they thought that God had called them by Successes to Govern and take Care of the Commonwealth, and of the Interest of all his People in the Land; and that if they stood by and suffered the Parliament to do that which they thought was dangerous, it would be required at their hands, whom they thought God had made the Guardians of the Land.

Having thus forced his Conscience to justifie all his Cause, (the Cutting off the King, the setting up himself and his Adherents, the pulling down the Parliament and the Scots,) he thinketh that the End being good and necessary, the necessary means cannot be bad: And accordingly he giveth his Interest and Cause leave to tell him, how far Sects shall be tollerated and commended, and how far not; and how far the Ministry shall be owned and supported, and how far not; yea, and how far Professions, Promises, and Vows shall be kept, or broken; and therefore the Covenant he could not away with; nor the Ministers, further than they yielded to his Ends, or did not openly resist them. He seemed exceeding open hearted, by a familiar Rustick affected Carriage, (especially to his Soldiers in sporting with them): but he thought Secrecy a Vertue, and Dissimulation no Vice, and Simulation, that is, in plain English a Lie, or Perfidiousness to be a tollerable Fault in a Case of Necessity: being of the same Opinion with the Lord Bacon, (who was not so Precise as Learned) That [the best Composition and Temperature is, to have openness in Fame and Opinion, Secrecy in habit, Dissimulation in seasonable use; and a power to feign if there be no remedy,] Essay 6. pag. 31. Therefore he kept fair with all, saving his open or unreconcileable Enemies. He carried it with such Dissimulation, that Anabaptists, Independants, and Antinomians did all think that he was one of them: But he never endeavoured to perswade the Presbyterians that he was one of them; but only that he would do them Justice, and Preserve them, and that he honoured their Worth and Piety; for he knew that they were not so easily deceived. In a word, he did as our Prelates have done, begin low and rise higher in his Resolutions as his Condition rose, and the Promises which he made in his lower Condition, he used as the interest of his higher following Condition did require, and kept up as much Honesty and Godliness in the main, as his Cause and Interest would allow.

40.

SIR THOMAS FAIRFAX.

Born 1612. Died 1671.

By RICHARD BAXTER.