The Irish standard., 1902-04-26

trick of tongue, gesture, expression by
which man could deceive his fellow.
He could weep at will, pray, preach,
affirm swear, cajole. belle, act the buf-
foon with the corporal, play school
boy tricks while signing the death
warrant of the king, commit the most
appalling deeds with the name of God
upon his lips and the Bible in his hand.
He was the greatest dissembler that
history held record of.
While raving Of liberty he suspended
in turn every liberty that Englishmen
had ever known-representati in par
lament, trial by jury, taxation with
consent-everything that the people
had gained and valued.
He proposed to sell st. Paurs to the
Jews for synagogue. He sold hun
dreds of English gentlemen and thou
sands of Irish men, women and chill
dren to West Indian planters to be
slaves.
He arrested and locked up in the
tower the three counsel of London
merchant who was prosecuted for hav-
ing refused to pay taxes which had not
been voted by Parliament. When con-
fronted with all this perfidy he fell
upon his knees in the House Of Com
mons and took solemn oath that it
was untrue.
He was false to his own chosen band
of supporters and to the inner circle
of his friends: and to each one of those.
parties whom he deceived in turn he
used the same solemn asseverations of
rectitude, piling perjury upon perjury
such as no age had ever seen before.
Did he deceive even himself? That
question we could not answer. 1t was
possible that having deceived every one
enemies, friends, comrades-he had
come at last to deceive himself. The
world held no greater failure in it's
history than our Civil Wac. The re-
suit was that the king lost his head
and the Parliament lost every shred of
privilege and liberty it had ever pos
sessed. For years Cromwell ruled the
land, with heavy sword and booted
foot. He abolished the House of Lords
and he shut up the Commons.
He taxed without representation. He
tried without jury. He ruled by mar
tial law. He packed the courts, he ar
rested counsel, he hanged and behead-
ed as he pleased.
His little finger lay heavier upon the
nation, said the people of the time,
than the loins of the late king had
slain. And then he died, and there
came back to the weary and blood
sucked land king.
Cromwell left nothing behind him
no public works, no new system of law,
no better policy of land, no clearer con-
ception Of justice. Nothing cried at
his funeral" wrote Evelyn, "but the
dogs"
And that, the dismalest failure of
English history, was the man in whose
praise to-day histories were imagined
and statues inaugurated.
Courage, diligence and the most dog
ged and determined resolution these
things he had to an extraordinary de-
gree. But to what end and at what
cost did he use them? 1t was cow
ardly and base act of the Parliament
of 1860 to dig up his remains and hang
his mouldering body on the gibbet at
Tyburn. It was voted without dis
sentient voice in the House of Com
MONS but history had missed one
strange coincidence which resulted
from it. They could remember the
choice which Cromwell in the days of
his victory gave the unfortunate Irish
-"Hell or Connaught." He turned to
the last page of Cromwell's latest biog-
rapher, and this was what he read:
"Where Connaught square now stands,
yard or two beneath the street, trod.
den under foot and beaten by horses
hoofs, lies the dust of the great Pre-.
tector." And that was the end. cloud
cheers)