humanity, when Colonel Howard told him, on his father's death, that nothing but vigorous and violent measures could fecure the Protectorate to him, and that he fhould run no rifk, for that he himself (Howard) would be answer able for the confequences; Richard replied, "Everyone fhall fee that I will do nobody any "harm: I never have done any, nor ever will. "I fhall be much troubled if anyone is injured "on my account; and instead of taking away "the life of the least person in the nation for "the preservation of my greatnefs, (which is a "burthen to me,) I would not have one drop of "blood fpilt."

Richard, on his difmiffion from the Protectorate, refided some time at Pezenas, in Languedoc, and afterwards went to Geneva. Some time in the year 1680 he returned to England, and refided at Cheshunt in Hertfordshire.

In 1705 he loft his only fon, and became in right of him poffeffed of the manor of Horsley, which had belonged to his mother. Richard, then in a very advanced age, fent one of his daughters to take poffeffion of the estate for him. She kept it for herself and her fifters, allowing her father only a small annuity out of it, till she was difpoffeffed of it by a fentence of one of the Courts of Westminster-Hall. It was requi

VOL. I.

BB

fite

fite for this purpose that Richard should appear in perfon; and the Judge who prefided, tradition fays, was the elegant and eloquent Lord Chancellor Cowper, who ordered a chair for him in court, and defired him to keep on his hat.

As he was returning from this trial, curiofity led him to see the House of Peers, when being afked by a perfon, to whom he was a stranger, if he had ever seen anything like it before; he replied, pointing to the throne," Never, fince I "fat in that chair."

Richard Cromwell enjoyed a good state of health to the age of eighty-fix, and died in the year 1712. He had taken, on his return to England, the name of Richard Clark.

SIR HENRY VANE, JUN.

THERE feems never, in the History of Mankind, to have been a more complicated character than that of Sir Henry Vane, fo fagacious and refolute as to daunt and intimidate even Cromwell himself, yet fo vifionary and fo feebleminded as to be a Seeker and Millennist. His fpeech refpecting Richard Cromwell is a master

piece of good fenfe and of eloquence. His writings on religious fubjects are beneath contempt. His behaviour on the fcaffold was dignified and noble, and he appears to have been executed contrary to the word of his Sovereign.

The following Letter addreffed to Lord Clarendon is printed in Harris's "Life of Charles "the Second."

"Hampton Court, Saturday, "Two in the Afternoon.

"The relation that has been made to me of "Sir Henry Vane's carriage yesterday in the "Hall*, is the occafion of this letter, which (if "I am rightly informed) was fo infolent, as tó justify all he had done, acknowledging no fupreme power in England but a Parliament, "and many things to that purpose. You have ❝ had a true account of all, and if he has given new occafion to be hanged, certaynlye he is too "dangerous a man to let live, if we can honestly put him out of the way. Think of this, and "give me fome accounte of it to-morrowe, 'till "when I have nothing to say to you.

66

C."

Sir Henry opposed the Protectorate of Richard Cromwell, in the following short and impres five speech in the House of Commons:

"One would (faid he) bear a little with Oli"ver Cromwell, though, contrary to his oath of "fidelity to the Parliament, contrary to his duty

66

to the public, contrary to the respect he owed "that venerable body from whom he received

his authority, he ufurped the government. "His merit was fo extraordinary, that our judg"ments, our paffions, might be blinded by it. "He made his way to empire by the most illuf"trious actions. He had under his command

an army that had made him Conqueror, and "a people that had made him their General. "But as for Richard Cromwell his fon, Who is "he? What are his titles? We have feen that " he had a fword by his fide, but, Did he ever "draw it? and, what is of much more import<< ance in this cafe, Is he fit to get obedience "from a mighty nation who could never make

66

a footman obey him? Yet this man we must

recognize under the title of Protector; a man "without worth, without courage, and without conduct. For my part, Mr. Speaker, it fhall "never be faid that I made fuch a man my "mafter."

Provoft Baillie, in one of his letters to his wife in Scotland, thus deferibes Cromwell and Sir Henry Vane:

"They be of nimble hot fancies for to put all "in confufion, but not of any deep reach. St.

" John

John and Pierpont are more stayed, but not great "heads. Say and his fon not-albeit wiser,

yet of fo dull, four, and fearful a tempera"ment, that no great atchievement in reafon "could be expected from them. The reft, "either in the Army or in the Parliament of "their party, are not in their myfteries, and of "no great parts, either for counsel or action, as "I could obferve."

CHARLES PATIN.

THIS Frenchman, fon of the celebrated Gui Patin, was, in England in the year 1672. In giving an account to the Margrave of Baden Dourlach of what he faw in London in that year, he mentions having feen (upon what he calls le Parlement, but which I fuppofe was WestminsterHall) the heads of Cromwell, Ireton, and Bradfhaw. He fays:

"On ne fauroit les regarder fans palir, et "craigner qu'elles vont jetter ces paroles épou "vantables: Peuples, l'eternité n'expiera pas

ἐσ

i notre attentat. Apprenez à notre exemple, que "la vie des Rois eft inviolable."