BOOKS.
ARREST OF THE FIVE MEMBERS.* - AMONG the very best illustrators of that remarkable epoch of English history, in which the struggle between the King and Parliament was either in preparation or in progress we number Mr. John Forster' the author of the Statesmen of the Common- wealth and of an Essay describing the Debates on the Grand Re- monstrance. To our previous obligations to Mr. Forster is now superadded a fresh debt of gratitude. An Account of the Arrest of the Five Members by Charles the First, "elicited from trust- worthy and as yet unpublished contemporary records," must be regarded as a valuable contribution to that still unwritten classi- cal history of the great contest, for the conservation and extension of authority on the one hand ; and the free development of national thought, national feeling, national life, on the other hand.
It is not that we can absolutely accept the noble but narrow Puritanism of the seventeenth century, or that we reject art, which Anglicanism then in some degree loved, supported and ad- vanced. The real point at issue, omitting for the moment the consideration of the collateral questions was Liberty versus Au- thority. The nation, terrified by the shadow of Popery' so hostile to all growth, inclined, in its frantic impulsion towards the light, to the white glare of Puritanism, with an ascetic disavowal of the prismatic colours which our lowly earth, with its sweet but humble humanities, not only tolerates but imperiously demands. Puritanism in fact, or the fanatic strain for the divine without the human, once installed in the high places of its power, with its cruel, and in part, false old Covenant in one hand, would have done precisely what Anglican despotism attempted to do, with the sword, of the Lord (absolute executive authority) in the other. Puritanism was true, necessary, divine if you will, as a protest against tyranny, persecution, and repression ; it was true, as an effort at political evolution : it was true, as it was an affirmation of personal worth, of the right of private judgment, of the sacred- ness of conscience, and even of individual self-development; " Inde- pendency " being assumed as the ultimate expression of Puri- tanism. But, in its idolatrous preference of the spirit of the Old to that of the New Testament; in its rigid Sabbatarianism ; in its ascetic rejection of art and negations of life ; in its suppres- sion of individuality, at least in its more Presbyterian phases ; and, by its frenzied extravagances, in its maturer developments, Puritanism shows that it, too, has its falsehoods, its shorte,omings, its excesses, and that when placed in dogmatic juxtaposition with Anglicanism it has neither moral nor religious superiorities to re- commend it. In fact, when we have enumerated all its excellen- cies, we must still acknowledge with Carlyle that it had not, but was very far from having, supreme excellence. "Puritanism was not the complete theory of this immense universe ; no, only a part thereof." Yet, after every deduction, it still, perhaps remains the "second world-great thing," in English history ; the Litera- ture of Shakespeare being the first.
"The armed appeal of Puritanism to the invisible God of Heaven against many very visible devils on earth and elsewhere," still awaits its "sacred poet." Meanwhile, Mr. Forster has done its future " vates" most valuable service, by his sedulous inquisi- tion into its facts, and his not entirely unrhythmical utterance of them. Such service is fittingly illustrated in the admirable work now before us. Thoughtful, pictorial, minute in present- ment, original in research, and masculine in treatment, this newly-written chapter of English history will be a sterling and. permanent acquisition to the student of the time of the second Stuart, who reigned over England, Scotland, and Ireland.
"One of the most fatal days in the life of Charles the First," says Mr: Yorster, "is generally and justly accounted to have been that wherein he made the attempt to seize with his own hand upon five Members of the House of commons sitting in their places in Parliament, against whom on the day preceding he had exhibited in the Upper House, through his Attorney-General, articles of impeachment for high treason." This incident, with its preliminary and attendant circumstances, Mr. Forster declares to have been made "the subject of Lord Clarendon's most elabo- rate, ingenious' and studied misrepresentation." To rescue it from the noble historian's perversion, and to restore to it its real significance and actual proportions has been Mr. Forster's aim.
In the prosecution of this object, he has consulted authorities still existing in manuscript ; for instance, the letters of trust- worthy Royalist correspondents of Admiral Sir John Pennington's, then commanding the fleet in the downs ; the same Pennington, who, a little later, carried Lord Digby across the Channel, witg. "the Queen and the English crown jewels to be employed abroad in raising material and means for the waging of civil war at home." Among these correspondents may be mentioned Captain Slingsby and "Mr. Thomas Wiseman, a man of considerable wealth and influence."
In Mr. Forster's view, the arrest of the five Members was no exceptional act on the ;art of Charles the First, nor is it repre- sented as such by the writer of the famous Eikon Basilike. It was the appropriate sequel of all that the King and the King's party had been attempting since the day of Strafford's execution ; it was preceded by the removal of the guard from the House anti the substitution of companies officered by Charles himself; by an * Arrest of the Five Members by Charles the First. A Chapter on English His- tory Rewritten. By John Forster. Published by John Murray. assault on the privileges of the Commons ; by a recasting of the offices at Court, that he might invite into his councils the leading opponents of the Great Remonstrance ; by the withdrawal of Balfour and the appointment of the desperado, Lunsford, to the governorship of the Tower which commanded the city ; by the attempt to conciliate Pym with the offer of the Chan- cellorship of the Exchequer, Pym being "the only popular leader not committed to root and branch." In fact, Mr. Forster shows that there is good- reason for rejecting " Clarendon's asser- tion that the Arrest was a sudden act as suddenly repented of." He argues that the King's persistence in the outrage; that his omission to profit by the counsel of his professed advisers, Falk- land, Culpeper and Clarendon himself, between the 4th and 9th of January, the days of Charles's entrance into the House of Com- mons and of his flight from Whitehall ; that his first proclamation on the evening of the 4th ; that his warrants, visits to Whitehall and second proclamation on the 5th ; that the commission of the Royal Sergeant into the city in order to effect the arrest on the morning of the 6th ; that the third proclamation on the 8th, at once attest the deliberate intention of the King, and justify the Parliament in accepting their challenge thus forced upon it. Far from regarding the King's scheme as a "braggart display of force it was never designed to use," Mr. Forster assumes that Charles honestly believed himself to be in possession of evidence which, before such a tribunal as might be obtained to try them, would bring the accused members certainly within the penalties of trea- son." He contends that the stake played for was worth the hazard ; for, if it failed, the King's case would be no worse than it already was ; whereas, if it succeeded, if it struck down the leaders of the Majority in the House, intimidation would soon operate on their followers, the Minority which had rallied against the Re- monstance might be reinforced under less troublesome chiefs "and the English people be led back into bondage by the very power which had effected their deliverance." The attempt happily failed. Its failure is easily explained. The Queen was in the confidence of the King. The critical day had arrived, and she was now awaiting the expiry of the one hour that might have seen Charles autocrat of his kingdom. Thinking that hour had passed, she ex- claimed as Lady Carlisle suddenly entered the room, "Rejoice, for I hope that the King is now master in his states, and that Pym and his confederates are in custody." "Within an hour from that time," adds Madame de Motteville, "Pym knew what was to be done that day." At this period, lady Carlisle had more than attained the mature age of forty. Mr. Forster, therefore, concludes that Sir Philip Warwick's imputation that she had changed her " gallant " from Strafford to Pym, is mere scandal. He considers the act of be- trayal by "this strong-willed woman by far the most generous and the most constant of all the adherents of Strafford," as an ad of vindictive retribution for the king's treacherous desertion of their common friend. To confirm this view, Mr. Forster quotes the suppressed passage from Clarendon in which the Countess's transfer of allegiance is recorded, without either reproach or as- persion. The citation appears to us more decisive in its omissions and by its suppression than in its positive testimony, which we do not think sufficiently explicit ; since "her eminent and constant affection to the Earl of Strafford," is necessarily introduced to ac- count for the confidence reposed in Lady Carlisle, while the state- ment that "she discovered whatever she had been trusted with," is unaccompanied with any ascription of motive. However this be, the Countess betrayed the secret to Pym. The great Puritan leader, with Hampden, Hollis, Haselrig and Strode were commanded by the House to absent themselves, purposely, to avoid collision with the king and his armed force. They withdrew ao- cordingly, not without resistance from Strode who declared that he "would deal his innocency with his blood." When Charles arrived, he found his birds flown," and had to return, disappointed, to his palace, while the ominous words privilege ! privilege !" were shouted after him as he left the House!
In Mr. Forster's vivid description of this tragical incident, he establishes, in opposition to Clarendon, who, "with inconceivable assurance," maintains that it was "visible to all men that the King had only with him his guard of halbadiers," and fewer of them than on ordinary occasions,—that the number of armed men who accompanied the King was about five hundred, subpoenaing as historical witnesses Ferney, Rushworth, Ludlow, May, Hutch- inson, D'Ewes, and Captain Slingsby. Mr. Forster further charges Clarendon with raising a false issue. Clarendon states "that the leaders claimed immunity against even regular proceed- ing upon the charge of treason, thus " practising largely indeed
upon the carelessness or credulity of his readers." This is not true. The House, in reply to the King's message, sent word by a deputation, which included Culpeper and Falkland, that the accused "should be ready to answer any legal charge." The Five Members, moreover, were required to attend daily. In point of fact, thinks Mr. Forster, the issue raised was and could be no other than one of violence. "Five Commoners had been accused of treason before a tribunal which had not the shadow of a jurisdiction to try them ; and the forms of the grand jury, which for centuries had shielded and protected the English
sub- ject, had given place to a lawless exercise of the most hateful of all the processes of law and of prerogative, an Attorney-General's ex-officio upon the information of the King ; followed by " deliberate attack on the privileges of the House of Commons and the persons of its Members." The King's rash attempt to !seize these five men lost him his crown. He was the first of Kings,
writes William Lilly, that ever or so imprudently broke the pri- vileges by his entrance into the House of Commons assembled l in Parliament." After this, according to the same author, all con- fidence was at an end : "he not being able to trust them, nor they to trust him who had so often failed them." Even Mr. Hal- lam, "no friendly critic of the popular leaders at this crisis," is compelled to admit that the attempted arrest of the Five Members was "an evident violation, not of common privilege, but of all security for the independent existence of Parliament,"—a viola- tion which rendered the King's affairs irretrievable by anything short of civil war. Thus, Mr. Forster concludes :—
"There was manifestly no alternative left. Such middle course as D'Ewes would have proposed before resorting to an open defiance, was simply hopeless. It had become clear that the attempt upon the members could not be defeated without a complete overthrow of the power of the king. He could not remain at Whitehall if they returned to Westminster. Charles raised the issue, the Commons accepted it, and so began our Great Civil War. The King drew the sword upon the day when he went with his armed followers to arrest the Five Members in their places in the House. The House of Commons unfurled their standard on the day when, declining to surrender their Members, they branded with the epithet of a scandalous paper, the articles of impeachment issued by the King."
We have thus succinctly given Mr. Forster's view of this famous transaction. Our notice, however, has been necessarily too brief to do more than intimate the great value of his book. His representation of the circumstances, which preceded, accom- panied and followed the frustrated seizure, is exceedingly dra- matic, without being in the least degree theatrical. The intro- ductory chapter of the work is succeeded by one which has for its subject the King's return from Scotland. The false reliances and fatal mistakes of Charles, with that singular passage in which he first gives, and then retracts the lie given to Lord Newport ; the mutual relation of Charles and Pym; the Westminster tumults ; the fracas in the hail; the occurrences in the House ; the episode of the Bishops ; the preliminary incidents ; the impeachment and its sequel ; the scene in the Queen's apartments ; the Council of the 3d of January ; the midnight visit to the city ; the morning of the 4th ; the betrayal of the secret ; the King's approach and entrance of the House ; the after impression ; the panic; the ad- journment; the sittings at Grocer's Hall; the flight of the King and the return of the Five Members ; are chronicled and described with a vigour and picturesque precision which are very uncom- mon. The estimates of character given of Hampden, Pym, D'Ewes, Lenthal ; and the strictures on the canonical historian of the Civil War, Lord Clarendon, are deserving of close attention. We will only add that the volume opens with an analytical table of contents, and, closes with an index compiled with "great care and skill by Mr. Henry Campkin."
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