But when these bretheren in evil,7 9 That, like the christian faith, increas'd, 180 185 190 195 is always ready to serve its king and country, though it often suffers great afflictions and distresses. 7 But when these bretheren in evil,] The poet, to serve his metre, lengthens words as well as contracts them, thus lightening, oppugne, sarcasmous, affairs, bungleing, sprinkleing, benigne. • For new recruits of danger watch'd.] Recruits, that is, returns. • Before her time had turn'd destruction, Ta new and numerous production ;] The succession of loyalists was so quick, that they seemed to be perishing, and others supplying their places, before the periods usual in nature; all which is expressed with an allusion to equivocal generation. Whom neither chains, nor transportation, Proscription, sale or confiscation, Nor all the desperate events Of former try'd experiments, Nor wounds, could terrify, nor mangling, Nor death, with all his bones, affright 200 From vent'ring to maintain the right, From staking life and fortune down Until, in spite of force and treason, 205 210 215 1 'Gainst all together, for the crown:] That is, all of them together, namely, the several factions, their adversaries, and the devil. See v. 178. 2 Toss'd in a furious hurricane, Did Oliver give up his reign,] The Monday before the death of Oliver, August 30th, 1658, was the most windy day that had happened for twenty years; Dennis Bond, a member of the long parliament, and one of the king's judges, died on this day; wherefore, when Oliver likewise went away in a storm the Friday following, it was said, the devil came in the first wind to fetch him, but finding him not quite ready, he took Bond for his appearance. Dr. Morton,' in his book of Fevers, says, that Oliver died of an ague, or intermit And was believ'd, as well by saints 220 tent fever; and intimates, that his life might have been saved, had the virtues of the bark been sufficiently known; the distemper was then uncommonly epidemical and fatal: Morton's father died of it. As there was also an high wind the day Oliver died, both the poets and lord Clarendon may be right; though the note on A. Wood's Life insinuates, that the noble historian mistook the date of the wind. Wood's Life, p. 115. Waller says: In storms as loud as his immortal fame; and Godolphin: In storms as loud as was his crying sin. • As moral men and miscreants,] Some editions read mortal, but not with so much sense or wit. The independents called themselves the saints; the cavaliers, and the church of England, they distinguished into two sorts; the immoral and wicked, they called miscreants; those that were of sober, and of good conversation, they called moral men; yet, because these last did not maintain the doctrine of absolute predestination and justification by faith only, but insisted upon the necessity of good works, they accounted them no better than moral heathens. By this opposition in the terms betwixt moral men and saints, the poet seems to insinuate, that the pretended saints were men of no morals. To founder in the Stygian ferry, Until he was reliev'd by Sterry,] It was thought by the king's party, that Oliver Cromwell was gone to the devil; but Sterry, one of Oliver's chaplains, assured the world of his assumption into heaven. Sterry preached the sermon at Oliver's funeral, and comforted the audience with the following information: "As sure as "this is the Bible (which he held up in his hand) the blessed spirit " of Oliver Cromwell is with Christ, at the right hand of the Father, " and if he be there, what may not his family expect from him? "For if he were so useful and helpful, and so much good influenced "from him to them, when he was in a mortal state, how much more influence will they have from him now in heaven: the 66 Who, in a false erroneous dream,5 "Father, Son, and Spirit, through him, bestowed gifts and graces upon them." Bishop Burnet hath recorded more rant of this high-flown blasphemer, as I find him called by A. Wood, viz.—that praying for Richard Cromwell, he said, " Make him the brightness "of his father's glory, and the express image of his person." Archbishop Tillotson heard him. The following extract is from the register of Caversham, in Berkshire, communicated to me by the very ingenious and learned Dr. Loveday, of that place, to whom I rejoice to acknowledge my obligations for his assistance in the course of this work. "Vaniah Vaux, the daughter of captain George, and "Elizabeth Vaux, was born upon a Monday morning, between seven and eight o'clock, at Causham Lodge, being the 19th of May, 1656, and christened by Mr. Peter Sterry, minister and "chaplain to the Highness the Lord Protector." 66 Who, in a false erroneous dream,] Peter Sterry dreamed, that Oliver was to be placed in heaven, which he foolishly imagined to be the true and real heaven above; but it happened to be the false carnal heaven at the end of Westminster-Hall, where his head was fixed after the Restoration. There were, at that time, two victualling-houses at the end of Westminster-Hall, under the Exchequer, the one called Heaven, and the other Hell:* near to the former Oliver's head was fixed, January 30, 1660. Cromwell, Ireton, and Bradshaw, were drawn to Tyburn on three several sledges, and, being taken from their coffins, hanged at the several angles; afterwards their heads were cut off, and set on Westminster-Hall. The following is a transcript from a MS. diary of Mr. Edward Sainthill, a Spanish merchant of those times, and preserved by his descendants. "The 30th of January, being that day twelve years from the death "of the king, the odious carcases of Oliver Cromwell, major-general Ireton, and Bradshaw, were drawn in sledges to Tyburn, where they were hanged by the neck, from morning till four in the *Those gentlemen who had been restrained in the court of wards, were led through Westminster-Hall by a strong guard, to that place under the Exchequer, commonly called Hell, where they might eat and drink, at their own costs, what they pleased. 66 Profanely for th' apocryphal False heav'n at the end o' th' hall; : "afternoon. Cromwell in a green seare cloth, very fresh, em"balmed; Ireton having been buried long, hung like a dried rat, 66 yet corrupted about the fundament. Bradshaw, in his windingsheet, the fingers of his right hand and his nose perished, having "wet the sheet through; the rest very perfect, insomuch, that I "knew his face, when the hangman, after cutting his head off, held "it up of his toes, I had five or six in my hand, which the prentices "had cut off. Their bodies were thrown into an hole under the gallows, in their seare-cloth and sheet. Cromwell had eight cuts, "Ireton four, being seare-cloths, and their heads were set up on "the south-end of Westminster-Hall." In a marginal note is a drawing of Tyburn (by the same hand) with the bodies hanging, and the grave underneath. Cromwell is represented like a mummy swathed up, with no visible legs or feet. To this memorandum is added: 66 66 "Ireton, died the 26th of November, 1651. 66 Bradshaw, the 31st of October, 1659." In the same diary are the following articles :-" January 8th, 1661, "Sir A. Haslerigg, that cholerick rebel, died in the Tower. The “17th, Venner and his accomplice hanged-he and another in Cole"man-street; the other 17 in other places of the city. Sept. 3d, "1662, Cromwell's glorious, and yet fatal day, died that long speaker of the long parliament, William Lenthall, very penitently." Yet, according to other accounts, the body of Oliver has been differently disposed of. Some say, that it was sunk in the Thames; others, that it was buried in Naseby-field. But the most romantic story of all is, that his corpse was privately taken to Windsor, and put in king Charles's coffin; while the body of the king was buried in state for Oliver's, and, consequently, afterwards hanged at Tyburn, and the head exposed at Westminster-Hall. These idle reports might arise from the necessity there was of interring the protector's body before the funeral rites were performed: for it appears to have been deposited in Westminster-Abbey, in the place now occupied by the tomb of the duke of Buckingham. The engraved plate on his coffin is still in being. Sir John Prestwick, in |