That this Commission might tend to unite the different political parties, it was composed of no one denomination; that it might have its due influence in the after organization of the State, it was made up of both the clergy and the laity. Thus Cromwell sifted and winnowed the ministry; thus he separated the chaff from the wheat, and garnered up the latter forever, as the fruitful seed of the Church.

But the renovating and organizing genius of the Protector stopped not with the Church. It had already entered the State. In uniting the religious sects, he had allayed, to a great degree, the fierce contentions between the different political parties. From each he had selected the ablest and most influential men for his Commission; from each he had composed his Parliament. He had thus satisfied, or at least contented the great body of the nation. Only two parties now remained disaffected towards the Protectorate-the Royalists and the Ultra-republicans. The two extremes met. They possessed not a principle-not a sentiment in unison, yet their hostility to the existing government made them allies to each other. Towards both, Cromwell for a while exercised forbearance, but a spirit of mildness and indulgence rather fostered than quieted their disaffection. He, therefore, had recourse to a wiser policy. In the ranks of the Ultra-republicans he created dissensions; he set one faction against another, and thus ruined the influence of all. On the other hand, with the Royalists, he exercised authority, and destroyed those by his power, whom he could not make submissive by his word. Thus harmony was restored to the nation. The Church had yielded to the wisdom of the Protector-the State had now submitted to his power.

It is here, at this point, in the history of the policy of Cromwell, that we pause, and look with admiration at the beauty and magnificence of that structure of government, which we can never realize only from the grandeur of its ruins. It has long since passed away; its dome has fallen-its arches have given way-and its ashler stones have crumbled one by one, but its foundation still remains, as an everlasting monument to the wisdom and genius of its architect.

Such was the organizing policy of the Protector. It rested for its support upon two distinct principles; the one passive, the other active in its nature; the one made up of moral, the other of temporal power. On the one hand, he led the Church from the chaos of sectarianism, by his forbearance; on the other forced the State from its anarchy by his authority. The true expression for this policy was union--union of the political parties for the preservation of the State; union of the religious sects for the

safety of the Church. Its immediate results were harmony at home, and glory abroad. Its final fruits are now ripening on that tree of civil and religious liberty, whose roots, to-day, are everywhere striking deeper and deeper beneath the ruins of despotism, and whose branches are fast shadowing forever the crumbling fabrics of tyranny all over the world.

The policy of the Protector in the administration of the government differed essentially from his policy in its organization. It was no longer lenient, no longer flexible. The government of elements, once so varied, now so lately cemented, required a policy firm and inflexible-a policy without indulgence, without forbearance. Cromwell, therefore, abandoned the moral element, which in part constituted his organizing policy, and commenced at once to govern the Church and the State by temporal power alone. In every department of government he corrected abuses and introduced reforms. Everywhere was his vigilance and wisdom made manifest. The Court of Chancery-the Augean stable of corruption, the Tower-the Charnel-house of patriots, the Universities-the Babels of jesuitical knowledge, were at once either abolished or reformed. In the Church, purity and morality were insisted upon, with the same vigor of authority as reform and economy in the State; in the Camp, virtue took the place of immorality; in the Court, dissemblance gave way to honor and to truth. Thus the government of Cromwell became both political and religious in its nature. To him both the Church and the State were divine institutions, emanating alike from God, yet ruled over by human power. He believed that the evils of each were to be restrained the glory of each to be attained by the same form of government. He therefore united both under one system of administration-a system, whose power should be at the same time both political and religious.

It is not to be denied that the official alliance of Protestantism, at this time, with the State power, was detrimental to the cause of vital Christianity. Whenever religion becomes subservient to civil authority it loses in a great measure its true spirit; it substitutes the narrowness of mannerism for the expansion of liberty; exchanges the essence for the form of Christianity. Thus the administration of Cromwell, for a time, was injurious to religion. But the evils to which it gave birth were but transitory. On the other hand, the benefits which arose were permanent and invaluable. It gave life and strength to a spirit of liberty and truth, of which the world before was ignorant. The civil and religious institutions of all lands are the monuments of its glory-monuments around whose summits the eternal light of truth will ever linger, and against

whose foundations the ceaseless waves of error will forever beat and dash their anger in vain.

Like the home, so the foreign policy of Cromwell was composed of two elements; the one political, the other religious. The motive for the political element was conquest; not conquest for the purpose of the increase and consolidation of dominion, but an extension of territory for the safety and security of Great Britain. The motive for the religious element was the protection of the Church against the persecutions of Rome. With the Protector, the eternal interests of the Church always took the precedence of the temporal welfare of the State. He recognized all power as coming directly from the King of kings, and thought that power unjustly exercised if it tended not to advance and hasten His kingdom on the earth. Thus, if he made war upon Spain, it was a war against Rome; if he humbled Austria, it was to give life and strength to the Protestant cause in Poland; if he conquered Jamaica-if his armies were victorious in Flanders, it was not that the flag of St. George might wave over wider possessions, but that holy banners, in the name of Christ Jesus, might be set up in every land. Thus the foreign policy of Cromwell resolved the greatest problem of that age, and of all ages to come—a problem no less than whether the world should finally be all Papist or all Protestant--whether the thunders from the thrones of the Escurial and the Vatican should be the eternal indications of power, or the audible manifestations of that ruin out of which civil and religious liberty should spring up and flourish forever.

An Episode.

ONE eve of beauty, when the sun
Was on the stream of Guadalquiver,

To gold converting one by one,
The ripples of that mighty river;
Beneath me, on the bank was seated
A Seville girl, with auburn hair,

And eyes that might the world have cheated,
A bright, wild, wicked, diamond pair!

She stooped, and wrote upon the sand,
Just as the loving sun was going,
With such a soft small shining hand,
I could have sworn 'twas silver flowing!

ALL a-b-o-a-r-d-with the last syllable protracted, until we wonder at its tenacity-a pandemoniacal confusion, under the exclusive direction of porters, baggage owners and brakemen, assisted "for a short time only" by the spluttering, hissing monster just in with the connecting train-and we are safely in the cars. With a punctuality worthy of imitation by those who desire to cultivate the "cardinals," we move off, while our monster gives utterance to an unearthly bellowing, as if in exultation over its way worn brother. It is a maintainable theory we think, that most men love to retire within themselves while they travel. "Thirty miles an hour including stoppages," especially seems to effect a busy working of the mind, superficial indeed, but of uncommon rapidity and acuteness of perception. For instance, this idea itself was one of a thousand fancies which came crowding upon us before the Aladdin lamplooking buildings of the first station-an in-express-ibly small one-formed a discolored line across our field of view. Thoughts of College, then only a day or two in the background, of South Middle, of examinations generally and biennial specially, of the entomological specimen on the dress opposite, of the pretty gaitered foot beneath it, of the parched grass outside, and the dust inside, made up but a small part of the mental kaleidescope. How the wheels rattle, and as we pass a town which we remember to be catalogued as the abiding place of one of the vocalists of the class, seem to be humming Shule, shule ad infinitum. Then as the orchard of some thrifty farmer glides into sight, it changes to "a little more cider too," with two sharps on the last note of that inspiriting chorus, as some ill-matched joint passes beneath us. In short, any tune

we choose to call for, is produced with master-like promptness, until we find ourselves applauding by stamping lustily-perhaps, however, only to get the numbness out of our legs.

Of course our fellow travelers present an interesting study. They always do. Immediately in front sits a lad with hair, according to his mother, auburn, but which the world calls red, evidently returning from boarding school. Our thoughts revert to first presidents and In Unity prospects. A little before him one of the bone and sinew of the land, been down to York on his annual visit to the produce dealers of the metropolis, and returning with a new suit and enlarged experience. We think how this latter will be dealt out to night to his wife and daughters on their comfortable porch. Over there in the corner sits a western bound German, too respectable for the filthy emigrant car, but looking alone among strangers. Over against us, the owner of the pretty foot aforementioned. She is of the order plain but pretty; and with liquid eyes, into whose depths it seems as if we must gaze, and gazing become utterly oblivious that ours ever hunted after roots of the Greek. She quietly allows it— not a bit of Chapel St. about it—but with an air which tells that no enchroachment upon modest dignity will find encouragement-"no admission except on business" to the inner portals of her heart of hearts. A strapping youth, answering to "one from the country preferred," who sits some distance in front, seems to think with us, and wrenches uneasily on the dusty plush in his attempts to get a view of the pretty face. And so the cars rattle merrily onward, now over high embankments which tell of toiling, sweating sons of Erin, now through deep cuts and natural valleys, along waving fields, over bridges and cross roads, until at last we slacken up, the brakes creak until our teeth are on edge, and amid a crowd of bustling people who seem to have sprung from the ground ready-made at our approach—perhaps from teeth which our drag-on may have scattered under the depôt shed—our progress is arrested. The red-headed boy goes forward to the platform, the foreigner yawns listlessly and looks out of the window, while the farmer barters with an urchin tradesman for his last pint of pop-corn. The speaking eyes, to our regret unutterable, retire without so much as a parting glance, and still the rustic youth is of the same way of thinking with us, for his sigh seems laden with,

Oh, ever thus, from childhood's hours,
I've seen my fondest hopes decay,
I never rolled a barrel of flour,
But the staves were sure to give away.