THE HISTORY OF ENGLAND. CHAP. XXXIII. THE COMMONWEALTH. CROMWELL, who had fecretly folicited, A. D. 1649. and contrived the king's death, now began to feel wishes to which he had hitherto been a ftranger. His profpects widening as he rofe, his first principles of liberty were all loft in the unbounded ftretch of power that lay before him. When the peers met on the day appointed in their adjournment, they entered upon bufinefs, and fent down fome votes to the commons, of which the latter deigned not to take the least notice. In a few days after the comVOL. III, B mon's |