any hopes
of prevailing over them, but by laying the plan of an oblique and
artificial attack, which would conceal the real purposes of their
antagonists. The Scots and the Scottish commissioners, jealous of the
progress of the Independents, were a new obstacle, which, without the
utmost art and subtlety, it would be difficult to surmount.[**]

* Clarendon, vol. v. p. 562.

** Clarendon, vol. v. p. 562.

The methods by which this intrigue was conducted are so singular, and
show so fully the genius of the age, that we shall give a detail of them
as they are delivered by Lord Clarendon.[*]

A fast, on the last Wednesday of every month, had been ordered by the
parliament at the beginning of these commotions; and their preachers on
that day were careful to keep alive, by their vehement declamations, the
popular prejudices entertained against the king, against prelacy, and
against Popery. The king, that he might combat the parliament with their
own weapons, appointed likewise a monthly fast, when the people should
be instructed in the duties of loyalty, and of submission to the higher
powers; and he chose the second Friday of every month for the devotion
of the royalists.[**] It was now proposed and carried in parliament, by
the Independents, that a new and more solemn fast should be voted; when
they should implore the divine assistance for extricating them from
those perplexities in which they were at present involved. On that day,
the preachers, after many political prayers, took care to treat of the
reigning divisions in the parliament, and ascribed them entirely to the
selfish ends pursued by the members. In the hands of those members,
they said, are lodged all the considerable commands of the army, all the
lucrative offices in the civil administration: and while the nation is
falling every day into poverty, and groans under an insupportable load
of taxes, these men multiply possession on possession, and will in
a little time be masters of all the wealth of the kingdom. That such
persons, who fatten on the calamities of their country, will ever
embrace any effectual measure for bringing them to a period, or insuring
final success to the war, cannot reasonably be expected. Lingering
expedients alone will be pursued; and operations in the field concurring
in the same pernicious end with deliberations in the cabinet, civil
commotions will forever be perpetuated in the nation. After exaggerating
these disorder