But that he was strictly honest and sincere in the prosecution of his own views, his bold and indomitable conduct is a sufficient attestation.

SIR JOHN BIRKENHEAD published a journal at Oxford, about 1640, called "Mercurius Aulius," in favour of the cavalier party of politicians. Being expelled from this city by the parliamentarians, he went to London, and wrote a multitude of pasquinades against the enemies of the royal cause; for which he was several times imprisoned. At the restoration, he was rewarded by being made Master of Requests.

JOHN SADLER wrote a work, in 1649, called the "Rights of the Kingdom; or, Customs of our Ancestors," which was a great favourite with Oliver Cromwell, who patronised the author. The same writer published "Albia; or, the new Island lately Discovered,” a political romance, of rather an interesting description.

PETER HEYLIN.-This writer was a well-known personage during the civil wars. He advocated the principles of Charles I. with great zeal and acrimony. He was the author of a number of political tracts, which will be found among his miscellaneous works, printed in folio, 1682. He likewise established a weekly paper, in behalf of the king's cause, which was published at Oxford.

MARCHANT NEEDHAM was another of the stirring and zealous political pamphleteers of the civil wars. He was born near Oxford in 1620. He commenced a paper against the cause of Charles I., entitled "Mercurius Britannicus," in which he promulgated the liberal doctrines of the reformers without qualification or compromise. But after the battle of Naseby, he took a sudden turn, and published a paper called

"Mercurius Pragmaticus," in which he libelled without mercy, all his former friends and supporters. When the parliamentary party were again on the ascendant, they sent him to prison; but not feeling comfortable here, he turned a third time, and in his "Mercurius Politicus," unsaid everything he had said before. This sunk him very low, and he was advised by his few friends, to leave the country, which he did; but on obtaining his pardon he returned again, and died in 1678.

A well-known writer on English literature remarks that "Marchant Needham, the great patriarch of newspaper writers, was a man of versatile talents and more versatile politics, a bold adventurer, and most successful, because the most profligate of his tribe. From college he came to London; was an usher in Merchant Taylor's School; then an under-clerk in Gray's Inn; at length studied physic and practised chemistry; and, finally, he was a captain, and in the words of honest Anthony Wood, 'siding with the rout and scum of the people, he made them weekly sport by railing at all that was noble in his intelligence, called 'Mercurius Britannicus,' wherein his endeavours were to sacrifice the fame of some lord, or any person of quality, and of the king himself, to the beast with many heads.' He soon became popular, and was known under the name of Captain Needham of Gray's Inn; and whatever he now wrote was deemed oracular. But whether from a slight imprisonment for aspersing Charles I., or some pique with his own party, he requested an audience on his knees with the king, reconciled himself to his majesty, and showed himself a violent royalist in his 'Mercurius Pragmaticus,' and galled the Presbyte

rians with his wit and quips. Some time after, when the popular party prevailed, he was still further enlightened, and was got over by President Bradshaw as easily as by Charles I. Our mercurial writer became once more a virulent presbyterian, and lashed the royalists outrageously in his 'Mercurius Politicus :' at length, on the return of Charles II., being now conscious, says our friend Antony, that he might be in danger of the halter, once more he is said to have fled into Holland, waiting for an act of oblivion. money given to a hungry courtier, Needham obtained his pardon under the great seal. He latterly practised as a physician among his party, but lived universally hated by the royalists, and now only committed harmless treasons with the College of Physicians, on whom he poured all that gall and vinegar which the government had suppressed from flowing through its natural channel*."

For

Charles being now, 1648, brought to the block, for his alleged violations of the rights of the people and the parliament, the Commonwealth commenced, under the direction of Oliver Cromwell and his army.

It is acknowledged by most writers on public affairs, that this revolutionary period, was a very critical one for the liberties of the nation. Public opinion on some of the fundamental principles of legislation had arrived at that point, which called for some firm and absolute decision respecting them. Religious feeling and sentiment were the active elements which raised the nation to a sense of its duty and political interests. The independent, the presbyterian, and the puritanical principles of civil and religious liberty, were held in

* Disraeli.

abeyance during the reign of Elizabeth; but became more prominently active and vigorous, in the reign of her successor, James I. During the sway of the unfortunate Charles I., and till he fell by the hand of the executioner, the great body of the English nation never once relaxed their efforts in the cause of popular right, and religious toleration. Cromwell, himself, says, that whatever might be the efficient and proximate causes of the commencement of the civil war, yet God soon brought it to a religious issue; and he constantly affirms, that amidst the contentions, and dangers, and sacrifices of war, the reward which he and his followers always had before them, was the freedom of worshipping God according to their conscience.

SECTION III.

From the death of Charles I. to the year 1700.

In the reign of Charles I., and during the Commonwealth, and even for a considerable time afterwards, it must be kept in remembrance, that there were floating in the public mind five distinct systems of church government; namely, Popery, Diocesan Episcopacy, Presbyterianism, Independency, and Erastianism. Each of these ecclesiastical forms sought to mould or modify civil liberty and political right in some fashion or other; and hence the writers of each system naturally adopted that particular political theory which was more or less in harmony with their respective views of church policy.

The execution of the king was, of itself, one of the most important political events the world ever witnessed. It imparted to the public mind of Europe new views of the ends or purposes of governments, and of the reciprocal duties of citizenship which spring out of, and sustain them. There can be little doubt, but that the writings which had previously appeared in England, and even on the continent, relative to the lawfulness and expediency of punishing royalty, when neglectful of its sacred and weighty obligations, had made a deep impression on the minds of the speculative politicians of the day, of all shades of party and opinion. The old ideas of irresponsible power had been greatly weakened by the repeated and eager discussions of various theories and schemes of general polity. The treatises on the subject had been numerous even in our own country; and the more scientific part of them had so clearly and forcibly developed the abstract nature of monarchical rule, that men, for the first time in their history, saw the justice, as well as necessity, of putting some limitation to royal prerogatives and privileges. Regal punishment, which appeared, at first, a daring and impious doctrine, soon became the current train of public thought, and the every day conversation of the multitude. Whether Charles fully merited to be selected as the first example of national vengeance, is not the proper view of the matter. It was the principle embodied in the people's right and power to bring to trial and pronounce judgment, that constituted the vital question at issue. Whether his death was justifiable or not, judged by the number and enormity of his own delinquencies, certain it is, that the event gave birth, shortly