reigned not purely in their own breasts, that his doom, though sought by them from patriotic, not interested motives, was, in itself, a measure of expediency. He was the victim, because the most dreaded foe, because they could not go on with confidence, while the only man lived, who could and would sustain Charles in his absurd and wicked policy. Thus, though he might deserve that the people on whom he trampled should rise up to crush him, that the laws he had broken down should rear new and higher walls to imprison him, though the shade of Eliot called for vengeance on the counsellor who alone had so long saved the tyrant from a speedier fall, and the victims of his own oppressions echoed with sullen murmur to the "silver trumpet" call,* yet, the greater the peculiar offences of this man, the more need that his punishment should have been awarded in an absolutely pure spirit. And this it was not; it may be respected as an act of just retribution, but not of pure justice.

Men who had such a cause to maintain, as his accusers had, should deserve the praise awarded by Wordsworth to him, who,

In a state where men are tempted still
To evil for a guard against worse ill,
And what in quality or act is best
Doth seldom on a right foundation rest,
Yet fixes good on good alone, and owes
To virtue every triumph that he knows.

The heart swells against Strafford as we read the details. of his policy. Even allowing that his native temper, prejudices of birth, and disbelief in mankind, really inclined him to a despotic government, as the bad best practicable, that his early espousal of the popular side was only a stratagem to terrify the court, and that he was thus, though a deceiver, no apostate, yet, he had been led, from whatever motives, to look on that side; his great intellect was clear of sight, the front presented by better principles in that time commanding. We feel that he was wilful in the course he took, and self-aggrandizement his principal, if not his only motive. We share the hatred of his time, as we see him so triumphant in his forceful, wrongful measures. But we would not have had him hunted down with such a

"I will not repeat, Sirs, what you have heard from that silver trumpet." One of the parliament speaking of Rudyard.

44

hue and cry, that the tones of defence had really no chance to be heard. We would not have had papers stolen, and by a son from a father who had entrusted him with a key, to condemn him. And what a man was this thief, one whose high enthusiastic hope never paused at good, but ever rushed onward to the best.

Who would outbid the market of the world,
And seek a holier than a common prize,
And by the unworthy lever of to-day
Ope the strange portals of a better morn.

*

Begin to-day, nor end till evil sink

In its due grave; and if at once we may not
Declare the greatness of the work we plan,
Be sure, at least, that ever in our eyes
It stand complete before us, as a dome
Of light beyond this gloom; a house of stars,
Encompassing these dusky tents; a thing
Absolute, close to all, though seldom seen,
Near as our hearts, and perfect as the heavens.
Be this our aim and model, and our hands

Shall not wax faint until the work is done.

He is not the first, who, by looking too much at the stars has lost the eye for severe fidelity to a private trust. He thought himself "obliged in conscience to impart the paper to Master Pym." Who that looks at the case by the code of common rectitude can think it was ever his to impart?

What monstrous measures appear the arbitrary construction put on the one word in the minutes which decided the fate of Strafford, the freeing the lords of council from the oath of secrecy under whose protection he had spoken there, the conduct of the House towards Lord Digby, when he declared himself not satisfied that the prisoner could with justice be declared guilty of treason; the burning his speech by the common hangman when he dared print it, to make known the reasons of his course to the world, when placarded as Straffordian, held up as a mark for popular rage for speaking it.* Lord Digby was not a man of honor, but they did not know that, or if they did, it had nothing to do with his right of private judgment. What could Strafford, what could Charles do more high-handed? If they had violated the privileges of parliament, the more reason parliament should respect their privileges, above all

* See Parliamentary History, Vol. IX.

the privilege of the prisoner, to be supposed innocent until proved guilty. The accusers, obliged to set aside rule, and appeal to the very foundations of equity, could only have sanctioned such a course by the religion and pure justice of their proceedings. Here the interest of the accusers made them not only demand, but insist upon, the condemnation; the cause was prejudged by the sentiment of the people, and the resentments of the jury, and the proceedings conducted, beside, with the most scandalous disregard to the sickness and other disadvantageous circumstances of Strafford. He was called on to answer "if he will come," just at the time of a most dangerous attack from his cruel distemper, if he will not come, the cause is still to be pushed forward. He was denied the time and means he needed to collect his evidence. The aid to be given him by counsel, after being deprived of his chief witness" by a master stroke of policy," was restricted within narrow limits. While he prepared his answers, in full court, for he was never allowed to retire, to the points of accusation, vital in their import, requiring the closest examination, those present talked, laughed, ate, lounged about. None of this disturbed his magnanimous patience; his conduct indeed is so noble, through the whole period, that he and his opponents change places in our minds; at the time, he seems the princely deer, and they the savage hounds.* Well, it is all the better for the tragedy, but as we read the sublime appeals of Pym to a higher state of being, we cannot but wish that all had been done in accordance with them. The art and zeal, with which the condemnation of Strafford was obtained, have had high praise as statesmanlike; we would have wished for them one so high as to preclude this.

*Who can avoid a profound feeling, not only of compassion, but sympathy, when he reads of Strafford obliged to kneel in Westminster Hall. True, he would, if possible, have brought others as low; but there is a deep pathos in the contrast of his then, and his former state, best shown by the symbol of such an act. Just so we read of Bonaparte's green coat being turned at St. Helena, after it had faded on the right side. He who had overturned the world, to end with having his old coat turned! There is something affecting, Belisarius-like, in the picture. When Warren Hastings knelt in Westminster Hall, the chattering but pleasant Miss Burney tells us, Wyndham, for a moment struck, half shrunk from the business of prosecuting him. At such a sight, whispers in every breast the monition, Had I been similarly tempted, had I not fallen as low, or lower?

No doubt great temporary good was effected for England by the death of Strafford, but the permanence of good is ever in proportion with the purity of the means used to obtain it. This act would have been great for Strafford, for it was altogether in accordance with his views. He met the parliament ready to do battle to the death, and might would have been right, had he made rules for the lists; but they proposed a different rule for their government, and by that we must judge them. Admit the story of Vane's pilfering the papers not to be true, that the minutes were obtained some other way. This measure, on the supposition of its existence, is defended by those who defend the rest.

Strafford would certainly have come off with imprisonment and degradation from office, had the parliament deemed it safe to leave him alive. When we consider this, when we remember the threat of Pym, at the time of his deserting the popular party, "You have left us, but I will never leave you while your head is on your shoulders," we see not, setting aside the great results of the act, and looking at it by its merits alone, that it differs from the administration of Lynch law in some regions of our own country. Lynch law, with us, has often punished the gamester and the robber, whom it was impossible to convict by the usual legal process; the evil in it is, that it cannot be depended upon, but, while, with one hand it punishes a villain, administers with the other as s ummary judgment on the philanthropist, according as the moral sentiment or prejudice may be roused in the popular breast.

We have spoken disparagingly of the capacities of the drama for representing what is peculiar in our own day, but, for such a work as this, presenting a great crisis with so much clearness, force, and varied beauty, we can only be grateful, and ask for more acquaintance with the same mind, whether through the drama or in any other mode.

Copious extracts have been given, in the belief that thus, better than by any interpretation or praise of ours, attention would be attracted, and a wider perusal ensured to Mr. Sterling's works.

In his mind there is a combination of reverence for the Ideal, with a patient appreciation of its slow workings in the actual world, that is rare in our time.

He looks re

ligiously, he speaks philosophically, nor these alone, but with that other faculty which he himself so well describes.

You bear a brain

Discursive, open, generally wise,

But missing ever that excepted point

That gives each thing and hour a special oneness.
The little key-hole of the infrangible door,

The instant on which hangs eternity,

And not in the dim past and empty future,
Waste fields for abstract notions.

Such is the demonology of the man of the world. It may rule in accordance with the law of right, but where it does not, the strongest man may lose the battle, and so it was with Strafford.

To R. B.

BELOVED friend! they say that thou art dead,
Nor shall our asking eyes behold thee more,
Save in the company of the fair and dread,
Along that radiant and immortal shore,
Whither thy face was turned for evermore.

Thou wert a pilgrim toward the True and Real,
Never forgetful of that infinite goal;
Salient, electrical thy weariless soul,

To every faintest vision always leal,

Even 'mid these phantoms made its world ideal.
And so thou hast a most perennial fame,

Though from the earth thy name should perish quite ;
When the dear sun sinks golden whence he came,
The gloom, else cheerless, hath not lost his light;
So in our lives impulses born of thine,

Like fireside stars across the night shall shine.

C. A. D.