For he (and his Officers) thought, that when the King was gone a Government there must be; and that no Man was so fit for it as he himself; as best deserving it, and as having by his Wit and great Interest in the Army, the best sufficiency to manage it:  Yea, they thought that God had called them by Successes to Govern and take Care of the Commonwealth, and of the Interest of all his People in the Land; and that if they stood by and suffered the Parliament to do that which they thought was dangerous, it would be required at their hands, whom they thought God had made the Guardians of the Land.

Having thus forced his Conscience to justifie all his Cause, (the Cutting off the King, the setting up himself and his Adherents, the pulling down the Parliament and the Scots,) he thinketh that the End being good and necessary, the necessary means cannot be bad:  And accordingly he giveth his Interest and Cause leave to tell him, how far Sects shall be tollerated and commended, and how far not; and how far the Ministry shall be owned and supported, and how far not; yea, and how far Professions, Promises, and Vows shall be kept, or broken; and therefore the Covenant he could not away with; nor the Ministers, further than they yielded to his Ends, or did not openly resist them.  He seemed exceeding open hearted, by a familiar Rustick affected Carriage, (especially to his Soldiers in sporting with them):  but he thought Secrecy a Vertue, and Dissimulation no Vice, and Simulation, that is, in plain English a Lie, or Perfidiousness to be a tollerable Fault in a Case of Necessity:  being of the same Opinion with the Lord Bacon, (who was not so Precise as Learned) That [the best Composition and Temperature is, to have openness in Fame and Opinion, Secrecy in habit, Dissimulation in seasonable use; and a power to feign if there be no remedy,] Essay 6. pag. 31.  Therefore he kept fair with all, saving his open or unreconcileable Enemies.  He carried it with such Dissimulation, that Anabaptists, Independants, and Antinomians did all think that he was one of them:  But he never endeavoured to perswade the Presbyterians that he was one of them; but only that he would do them Justice, and Preserve them, and that he honoured their Worth and Piety; for he knew that they were not so easily deceived.  In a word, he did as our Prelates have done, begin low and rise higher in his Resolutions as his Condition rose, and the Promises which he made in his lower Condition, he used as the interest of his higher following Condition did require, and kept up as much Honesty and Godliness in the main, as his Cause and Interest would allow.

40.

SIR THOMAS FAIRFAX.

Born 1612.  Died 1671.

By RICHARD BAXTER.

And these things made the new modelling of the Army to be resolved on.  But all the Question was how to effect it, without stirring up the Forces against them which they intended to disband:  And all this was notably dispatcht at once, by One Vote, which was called the Self-denying Vote, viz.  That because Commands in the Army had much pay, and Parliament Men should keep to the Service of the House, therefore no Parliament Men should be Members of the Army....