Parliament also passed what was called the “Self-denying Ordinance” (1644) (repeated in 1645).  It required all members who had any civil or military office to resign, and, as Cromwell seaid, “deny themselves and their private interests for the public good.”  The real object of this measure was to get rid of incompetent commanders, and give the People’s army (soon to be remodeled) the vigorous men that the times demanded.

With the outbreak of the war great numbers of little local newspapers sprang into short-lived existence in imitation of the first publication of that sort, the Weekly News, which was issued not quite twenty years before in the reign of James I (S422).  Each of the rival armies, it is said, carried a printing press with it, and waged furious battles in type against the other.  The whole country was inundated with floods of pamphlets discussing every conceivable religious and political question.

444.  The “New Model”; Death of John Hampden; the Solemn League and Covenant (1642-1645).

At the first battle fought, at Edgehill, Warwickshire (1642), Cromwell saw that the Cavaliers (S442) had the advantage, and told John Hampden (SS436, 440) that “a set of poor tapsters [drawers of liquor] and town apprentices would never fight against men of honor.”  He forthwith proceeded to organize his regiment of “Ironsides,” a “lovely company,” he said, none of whom swore or gambled.

After the first Self-denying Ordinance was passed (S443), Cromwell and Fairfax formed a new People’s army of “God-fearing men” on the same pattern, almost all of whom were Independents (S439).  This was called the “New Model” (1645) and was placed under the joint command of the men who organized it.  Very many of its officers were kinsmen of Cromwell’s, and it speedily became the most formidable body of soldiers of its size in the world,—­always ready to preach, pray, exhort, or fight.[1]

[1] “The common soldiers, as well as the officers, did not only pray and preach among themselves, but went up into the pulpits in all churches and preached to the people.”—­Clarendon, “History of the Rebellion,” Book X, 79.

Meanwhile John Hampden (SS436, 440) had been mortally wounded in a skirmish at Chalgrove Field, Oxfordshire.  His death was a terrible blow to the parliamentary army fighting in behalf of the rights of the people.[2]

[2] See Macaulay’s “Essay on Hampden.”  Clarendon says that Hampden’s death produced as great consternation in his party “as if their whole army had been cut off.”

Parliament endeavored to persuade the Scotch to give their aid in the war against the King.  The latter finally agreed to do so (1643) on condition that Parliament would sign the Solemn League and Covenant (S438).  Parliament signed it, and so made the Scotch Presbyterian worship the state religion of England and Ireland (1647).  In reality only a small part of the English people accepted it; but the charge forced a large number of Episcopal clergymen to leave their parishes.