interpretation of it which implied Church-disestablishment, while one at least, the Scottish Johnstone of Warriston, was positively against Liberty of Conscience beyond very narrow Presbyterian limits.  Nor, though probably all would have assented at that time to an oath abjuring Charles Stuart, were they all without taint of the Single Person heresy in other forms.  Some of them, including Whitlocke and Berry, would have liked to restore Richard; and Fleetwood and Lambert were not wrongly suspected of seeing the most desirable Single Person every morning in the looking-glass.  Milton’s former regard for Fleetwood must have suffered considerably by recent events; and he thought of Lambert as the very “Achan” to be dreaded.  But, farther, even had the two aristocracies been of perfectly satisfactory composition, they had abandoned that idea of their own permanence which Milton had made all but essential.  They had agreed that their chief work should consist in shaping out a fit constitution for the Commonwealth, and that the Committee of Safety should continue in power only till that should be done and the new Constitution should come into operation.

Such as it was, the new Government of the Wallingford-House Interruption had no objection to retaining Mr. Milton in the Latin Secretaryship if he cared to keep it.  That he had held the post throughout the whole of the Government of the Restored Rump (though all but in sinecure, as we must conclude from the cessation of the series of his Latin Letters in the preceding May) appears from a very interesting document in the Record Office.  The Council of State of the Rump, it is to be remembered, had not vanished with the Rump itself on Oct. 13, but had sat on for twelve days more, though with its number reduced by the secession of Hasilrig, Scott, Neville, and other very vehement Rumpers,—­the object being to maintain the continuity of the public business and to make the most amicable arrangement possible with the Army-officers.  That object having been accomplished by the institution, of the new Committee of Safety, the Council of the Rump, before demitting its powers to this new body, which was to meet on the 28th of October, held its own last meeting at Whitehall on the 25th.  At such a last meeting it was but business-like to clear off all debts due by the Council; and, accordingly, this was done by the issue of the following comprehensive money-warrant, signed by Whitlocke as President, and by four others of those present.

“These are to will and require you, out of such moneys as are or shall come into your hands, to pay unto the several persons whose names are endorsed the several sums of money to their names mentioned, making on the whole the sum of Three Thousand Six Hundred Eighty-two Pounds, Eight Shillings, and Six Pence:  being so much due to them for their salaries and service to this Council unto the Two-and-twentieth day of this instant October.