hem;
nor have there been wanting attentive and malicious observers to point
them out. For many years after the Restoration they were the theme of
unmeasured invective and derision. They were exposed to the utmost
licentiousness of the press and of the stage, at the time when the press
and the stage were most licentious. They were not men of letters; they
were, as a body, unpopular; they could not defend themselves; and the
public would not take them under its protection. They were therefore
abandoned, without reserve, to the tender mercies of the satirists and
dramatists. The ostentatious simplicity of their dress, their sour
aspect, their nasal twang, their stiff posture, their long graces, their
Hebrew names, the Scriptural phrases which they introduced on every
occasion, their contempt of human learning, their detestation of polite
amusements, were indeed fair game for the laughers. But it is not from
the laughers alone that the philosophy of history is to be learned. And
he who approaches this subject should carefully guard against the
influence of that potent ridicule which has already misled so many
excellent writers.

"Ecco il fonte del riso, ed ecco il rio
Che mortali perigli in se contiene:
Hor qui tener a fren nostro desio,
Ed esser cauti molto a noi conviene."

Those who roused the people to resistance; who directed their measures
through a long series of eventful years; who formed, out of the most
unpromising materials, the finest army that Europe had ever seen; who
trampled down King, Church, and Aristocracy; who, in the short intervals
of domestic sedition and rebellion, made the name of England terrible to
every nation on the face of the earth--were no vulgar fanatics. Most of
their absurdities were mere external badges, like the signs of
freemasonry or the dresses of friars. We regret that these badges were
not more attractive. We regret that a body to whose courage and talents
mankind has owed inestimable obligations had not the lofty elegance
which distinguished some of the adherents of Charles the First, or the
easy good-breeding for which the court of Charles the Second was
celebrated. But, if we must make our choice, we shall, like Bassanio in
the play, turn from the specious caskets which contain only the Death's
head and the Fool's head, and fix on the plain leaden chest which
conceals the treasure.

The Puritans were men whose minds had derived a peculiar character