Better would it have been for Charles had he let the ship sail, which
was to have borne Hampden and his Cousin, Oliver Cromwell, toward the
"Valley of the Connecticut." He recalled the man who was to be his evil
genius when he gave that order. Cromwell could not so accurately have
defined the constitutional right of his cause as Pym had done, nor make
himself its adored head as was Hampden; but he had a more compelling
genius than either. His figure stands up colossal and grim away above
all others from the time he raised his praying, psalm-singing army,
until the defeat of the King's forces at Naseby (1645), the flight of
the King and his subsequent surrender.

It was at this time that Cromwell began to manifest as much ability as
a political as he had done as a military leader. Hampden had fallen on
the battlefield, Pym was dead, he was virtual head of the cause.
Perhaps it needed just such a terrible, uncompromising instrument, to
carry England over such a crisis as was before her. Not
overscrupulous about means, no troublesome theories about Church or
State--no reverence for anything but God and "the Gospel."

When Parliament halted and hesitated at the last about the trial of the
King, it was the iron hand of Cromwell which strangled opposition, by
placing a body of troops at the door, and excluding 140 doubtful
members. A Parliament, with the House of Lords effaced, and with 140
obstructing members excluded, leaving only a small body of men of the
same mind, sustained by the moral sentiment of a Cromwellian Army,--can
scarcely be called a Representative body; nor can it be considered
competent to create a Court for the trial of a King! It was only
justifiable as a last and desperate measure of self-defence.

[Sidenote: Death of Charles I., 1649]