CROMWELL 



1643 



CROMWELL 



OLIVER CROMWELL 



Cambridge, little is known of his early life. In 

 1620 he married Elizabeth Bourchier, a woman 

 of some wealth, and after that date his move- 

 ments are better 

 known. Elected 

 to Parliament in 

 1628, he showed 

 no signs of his 

 future greatness, 

 but he delivered 

 one speech which 

 made it clear that 

 when the inev- 

 itable religious 

 conflict came he 

 would be on the 

 side of the Puri- 

 tans. Indeed, his 

 love for religious 

 toleration was so intense that at one time he 

 thought seriously of emigrating to America 

 to join the Puritan colony there. In 1640 

 came the beginning of his rise to prominence, 

 for in that year he was elected to what became 

 known as the Short Parliament and to the 

 Long Parliament which almost immediately 

 succeeded it. 



It must not be assumed, however, that Crom- 

 well at once took a leading part in that body. 

 He spoke on all important topics, especially 

 favoring the attempt to abolish the episcopacy, 

 but he was content to remain subordinate. 

 But when the Civil War broke out in 1642 

 he became the dominant force, for this man 

 who "never saw an army till he was forty" 

 was a born military genius. He trained his 

 cavalry till he had at his command the best- 

 drilled regiments in England, and in all the 

 battles in which he was at the head of the 

 Parliamentary forces the royalists were de- 

 feated, for hp,jpver IfL^t. a.J^alt.le. When, in 

 1645, the Self-Denying Ordinance was passed, 

 excluding members of Parliament from mili- 

 tary command, an exception was made in 

 favor of Cromwell, who continued to lead his 

 "Ironsides." Under him served men whom he 

 had picked for their religious enthusiasm no 

 less than for their military forcefulness. 



When the break came between the two fac- 

 tions of the Puritans, the Presbyterians and 

 the Independents, Cromwell identified himself 

 with the latter and strengthened his hold on 

 the army, while the Presbyterians ruled in 

 Parliament. Fearing that the latter sect would 

 actually restore to power the tyrannical Charles 

 I, to whom they had begun to make advances, 



Cromwell finally agreed to the execution of 

 the king, and was one of the signers of the 

 death warrant. In Ireland and in Scotland 

 strong royalist parties yet remained, but 

 Cromwell, by his stern methods and his vic- 

 torious battles, succeeded by 1650 in putting 

 down the last active movements in behalf of 

 the royal house. 



The Long Parliament, having been in session 

 for twelve years, refused to disband, nor would 

 it submit itself to Cromwell, so he disbanded 

 it in 1652 with the aid of his troops, and sum- 

 moned a new body. This showed itself capable 

 of accomplishing nothing, and when it dis- 

 solved of its own accord the officers of the 

 army took matters into their hands, drew 

 up the so-called Instrument of Government, 

 and made Cromwell Lord Protector. A Parlia- 

 ment was assembled, but proved to have no 

 object beyond making itself perpetual, and 

 the Lord Protector therefore dissolved it, re- 

 lying on the army for support in his wise and 

 tolerant schemes. The only other. Parliament 

 which he ever called (1656) offered him the 

 title of king, and it seems that he refused it 

 only because he dared not accept. 



T T h greatest__thing that Cromwell acconu. 

 pjished for England was the restoration. alJts 

 wjorld influence bjr means of a wise foreign ._ 

 policy. In the years just before the estab- 

 lishment of the Commonwealth it had almost 

 ceased to be looked upon as one of the great 

 powers, but at his death it stood fully as high 

 as it had ever done before. It might be ex- 

 pected that so determined an opponent of 

 absolutism would have banished all trace of it 

 from his ruling and have left on the constitu- 

 tional history of his country a lasting mark, 

 but such was not the case. In reality, he gov- 

 erned almost as absolutely as did Charles I, 

 but one difference must not be forgotten: 

 Cromwell had no wish to be tyrannical, bul 

 was obliged by the very troubled character 

 of the times to adopt stern measures. Charles 

 I was absolute with his own good in view] 

 Cromwell, only in the interests of his country. 



He died in 1658, and for two years his son 

 Richard endeavored to continue his father's 

 policy, but he was unsuccessful, and the peo- 

 ple welcomed the royal line in the person of 

 Charles II, in 1660. A.MCC. 



Consult Roosevelt's Oliver Cromwell; Mar- 

 shall's Story of Oliver Cromwell; Firth's Oliver 

 Cromwell and the Rule of the Puritans in En- 

 gland. 



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