A. In the mean time the Parliament raised an Army, and made the Earl of Essex General thereof; by which Act they declared what they meant formerly, when they petitioned the King for a Guard to be commanded by the said Earl of Essex: and now the King sends-out his Proclamations, forbidding Obedience to the Orders of the Parliament concerning the Militia; and the Parliament sends out Orders against the Execution of the Commissions of Array. Hitherto, though it were a War before, yet there was no Blood shed; they shot at one another nothing but Paper.

B. I understand now how the Parliament destroyed the Peace of the Kingdom; and how easily, by the Help of seditious Presbyterian Ministers, and of ambitious, ignorant, Orators, they reduced this Government into Anarchy but I believe it will be a harder Task for them to bring-in Peace again, and settle the Government either in themselves, or any other Governour or Form of Government. For, granting that they obtained the Victory in this War, they must be beholden for it to the Valour, good Conduct, or Felicity, of those to whom they give the Command of their Armies; especially to the General: whose good Success will, without Doubt, draw with it the Love and Admiration of the Soldiers; so that it will be in his Power, either to take the Government upon himself, or to place it where himself thinks good. In which case, if he take it not to himself, he will be thought a Fool; and, if he do, he shall be sure to have the Envy of his subordinate Commanders, who will look for a Share, either in the present Government, or in the Succession to it: for they will say, Has he obtained this Power by his own Efforts without our Danger, Valour, and Counsel? and must we be his Slaves, whom we have thus raised? or is not there as much Justice on our Side against him, as was on his Side against the King?

A. They will, and they did say so; insomuch that the Reason why Cromwell, after he had gotten into his own Hands the absolute Power of England, Scotland, and Ireland, under the Name of Protector, did never dare to take upon him the title of King, nor was ever able to settle it

upon

upon his Children. His Officers would not suffer it, as pretending after his Death to succeed him; nor would the Army consent to it, because he had ever declared to them, against the Government of a single Person.

B. But to return to the King. What Means had he to pay; what provision had he to arm; nay, to levy an Army able to resist the Army of the Parliament, maintained by the great Purse of the City of London, and Contributions of almost all the Towns Corporate in England, and furnished with Arms as fully as they could require ?

A. 'Tis true, the King had great Disadvantages: and yet, by little and little, he got a considerable Army, with which he so prospered, as to grow stronger every Day, and the Parliament weaker, till they had gotten the Scots, with an Army of 21,000 Men, to come into England to their Assistance. But to enter into the particular Narration of what was done in the War, I have not now Time. B Well then, we will talk of that at next meeting.

BEHEMOTH.

1

BEHEMOTH.

PART II.

B.WE left-off at the Preparations on both Sides for War: which when I considered by myself, I was mightily puzzled Fo find-out what Possibility there was for the King to equal he Parliament in such a Course; and what Hopes he had f Money, Men, Arms, fortified Places, Shipping, Counil, and Military Officers, sufficient for such an Enterrize against the Parliament, that had Men and Money 3 much at command, as the City of London, and other Corporation-Towns were able to furnish, which was more an they needed. And, for the Men they should setrth for Soldiers, they were, almost all of them, spightlly bent against the King and his whole Party; whom ey took to be either Papists, or Flatterers of the King, bold and avaritious adventurers, that had designed to ise their Fortunes by the Plunder of the City and other orporation-Towns. And, though I believe not that they ere more valiant than other Men, nor that they had so uch Experience in the War, as to be accounted good oldiers; yet they had that in them, which, in time of attle, is more conducing to Victory than Valour and xperience both together; and that was Spight.

And for Arms, they had in their Hands the chief Maazines, the Tower of London, and the Town of Kingon upon Hull, besides most of the Powder and Shot

The Earl of Essex is

made General of the Parliament's Army.

that lay in several Towns, for the Use of the Traine Bands.

Fortified Places there were not many then in England and most of them in the Hands of the Parliament. The King's Fleet was wholly in their Command unde the Earl of Warwick.

Of Counsellors they needed no more than such as wer of their own Body; so that the King was every wa inferiour to them, except it were perhaps in Officers.

4. I cannot compare their Chief Officers. For th Parliament, the Earl of Essex (after the Parliament ha voted the War) was made General of all their Forces both in England and Ireland; from whom all other Com manders were to receive their Commissions.

B. What moved them to make the Earl of Essex thei General? And for what cause was the Earl of Essex s displeased with the King, as to accept that Office?

A. I do not certainly know what to answer to eithe of those Questions: But the Earl of Essex had been i the Wars Abroad, and wanted neither Experience, Judge ment, nor Courage, to perform such an Undertaking And besides that, you have heard, I believe, how great Darling of the People his Father had been before him and what Honour he had gotten by the Success of hi Enterprize upon Cales, and in some other Military Ad tions. To which I may add, that this Earl himself wa not held by the People to be so great a favourite at Cour as that they might not trust him with their Army again the King. And by this you may perhaps conjecture th Cause for which the Parliament made Choice of him fo General.

B. But why did they think him discontented with th Court?

A. I know not that; nor indeed that he was so. H came to the Court as other Noblemen did, when Occasio was, to wait upon the King; but had no Office, till little before this Time, to oblige him to be there continu ally. But I believe verily, that the Unfortunateness of h Marriages had so discountenanced his Conversation wi the Ladies, that the Court could not be his

proper El

men

ment, unless he had some extraordinary Favour there to balance that Calamity: but for particular Discontent from the King, or Intention of Revenge for any supposed Disgrace, I think he had none, nor that he was any ways addicted to Presbyterian Doctrines, or other Fanatick Tenets in Church or State; saving only, that he was carriedaway with the Stream (in a manner) of the whole Nation, to think that England was not an absolute, but a mixt, Monarchy not considering that the supreme Power must always be absolute, whether it be in the King, or in the Parliament.

B. Who was the General of the King's Army?

King's Horse.

A. None yet, but himself; nor indeed had he yet any Prince Rupert, the Army; but there coming to him at that Time his two King's nephew, is Nephews, the Princes Rupert and Maurice, he put the made General of the Command of his Horse into the Hands of Prince Rupert, a Man, than whom no Man living has a better Courage, nor was more active and diligent in prosecuting his Commissions; and, though but a young Man then, was not without Experience in the conducting of Soldiers; as having been an Actor in part of his Father's Wars in Germany.

B. But how could the King find Money to pay such in Army as was necessary for him to make head against he Parliament?

A. Neither the King nor the Parliament had much Money at that Time, in their own Hands, but were fain to rely upon the Benevolence of those that took their Parts. Wherein I confess, the Parliament had a mighty great Advantage. Those that helped the King in that kind were only Lords and Gentlemen, who, not approving the proceedings of the Parliament, were willing to undertake the Payment every one of a certain Number of Horse-Soldiers; which cannot be thought any very great Assistance, the Persons that payed them being so few. For other Moneys that the King then had, I have not heard any, but what he borrowed upon Jewels in the LowCountries. Whereas the Parliament had a very plentiful Contribution, not only from London, but generally from their Faction in all other Places of England, upon certain Propositions (published by the Lords and Commons 202

of

in

The two Houses of Parliament raised mo of the war by borrowing it of the peo

ney for the support