“Whatever the prejudices of some may suggest, it will be admitted by all unbiassed judges, that the Protestant Reformation was neither more nor less than an open rebellion. Indeed, the mere mention of private judgment, on which it was avowedly based, is enough to substantiate this fact. To establish the right of private judgment, was to appeal from the Church to individuals; it was to increase the play of each man’s intellect; it was to test the opinion of the priesthood by the opinions of layme

“It was in the name of faith and religious liberty that, in the sixteenth century, commenced the movement which, from that epoch, suspended at times but ever renewed, has been agitating and exciting the world. The tempest rose first in the human soul: it struck the Church before it reached the State.”— Guizot . In Germany, as we have seen, from a religious and popular, the Reformation degenerated into a mere scholastic and political movement, favourable to the pretensions of the ruling and privi

“The lawful power of making laws to command whole politic societies of men, belongeth so properly to the same entire societies, that for any prince or potentate of what kind soever upon earth, to exercise the same of himself, and not either by express commission immediately and personally received from God, or else by authority derived at the first from their consent, upon whose persons they impose laws, it is no better than mere tyranny. Laws they are not therefore which public approbation hath

“The way to cast out Kingly Power is not to cast it out by the Sword; for this doth but set him in more power, and removes him from a weaker to a stronger hand. The only way to cast him out is for the people to leave him to himself, to forsake fighting and all oppression, and to live in love one towards another. The Power of Love is the True Saviour.”— Winstanley , A New Year’s Gift for the Parliament and Army . The Council of State which, on February 13th, 1649, within a month of the execution

“Your word-divinity darkens knowledge. You talk of a body of Divinity, and of Anatomysing Divinity. O fine language! But when it comes to trial, it is but a husk without the kernel, words without life. The Spirit is in the hearts of the people whom you despise and tread under foot.”— Winstanley , The New Law of Righteousness (1649) . Gerrard Winstanley, whose strange entry on the stately stage of English History we have recorded in the previous chapter, was born at Wigan in the County of Lancash

“There is nothing more sweet and satisfactory to a man than this, to know and feel that spiritual power of righteousness to rule in him which he calls God.... Wait upon the Lord for teaching. You will never have rest in your soul till He speaks in you. Run after men for teaching, follow your forms with strictness, you will still be at a loss, and be more and more wrapped up in confusion and sorrow of heart. But when once your heart is made subject to Christ, the Law of Righteousness, looking up

“The great Lawgiver in Commonwealth’s Government is the Spirit of Universal Righteousness dwelling in mankind, now rising up to teach everyone to do to another as he would have another do to him.... If any goes about to build up Commonwealth’s Government upon Kingly principles, they will both shame and loose themselves: for there is a plain difference between the two Governments.”— Winstanley , The Law of Freedom . On January 26th, 1648 (1649), four days prior to the execution of Charles the Fir

“O England, England! wouldst thou have thy government sound and healthful? Then cast about and see and search diligently to find out all those burthens that came in by Kings, and remove them; and then will thy Commonwealth’s Government arise from under the clods under which as yet it is buried and covered with deformity.”— Winstanley , The Law of Freedom . The place in the country to which our hero had retired was, we believe, the little town of Colnbrook, in the extreme southern end of the coun

“Take notice, That England is not a Free People till the Poor that have no land have a free allowance to dig and labor the Commons, and so live as comfortably as the Land Lords that live in their Inclosures. For the people have not laid out their monies and shed their blood that their Land Lords, the Norman Power, should still have its liberty and freedom to rule in tyranny, but that the Oppressed might be set free, prison doors opened, and the Poor People’s heart comforted by an universal conse

“For you must either establish Commonwealth’s Freedom in power, making provision for everyone’s peace, which is Righteousness, or else you must set up Monarchy again. Monarchy is twofold, either for one king to reign, or for many to rule by kingly principles. For the king’s power lies in his laws, not in his name. And if either one king rule, or many rule by kingly principles, much murmuring, grudges, troubles, and quarrels may and will arise among the oppressed people upon every gained opportun

“All men have stood for Freedom; thou hast kept fasting-days and prayed in the morning exercises for Freedom; thou hast given thanks for victories because hopes of Freedom; plenty of Petitions and Promises thereupon have been made for Freedom. But now the common enemy is gone, you are all like men in a mist seeking for Freedom, but know not where nor what it is.... Assure yourselves, if you pitch not now upon the right point of Freedom in action, as your Covenant hath it in words, you will wrap

“Hear, O thou Righteous Spirit of the Whole Creation, and judge, who is the thief, he who takes away the Freedom of the Common Earth from me, which is my Creation Right; Or I, who take the Common Earth to plant upon for my free livelihood, endeavouring to live as a Free Commoner, in a Free Common-wealth, in Righteousness and Peace.”— Winstanley , The Law of Freedom . It was probably during the anxious times that beset the little community of Diggers during the winter of 1649-1650, that Winstanle

“There is but one way to remove an evil—and that is to remove its cause. Poverty deepens as wealth increases, and wages are forced down while productive power grows, because land, which is the source of all wealth and the field of all labour, is monopolised. To extirpate poverty, to make wages what justice demands they should be, the full earnings of the labourer, we must therefore substitute for the individual ownership of land a common ownership. Nothing else will go to the cause of the evil—i

The above words of Shelley might have been written purposely to serve as a preface to Winstanley’s final work, the main contents of which we now propose to lay before our readers. It happened to be the first of Winstanley’s works that fell into our hands, when, many years since, in consequence of Carlyle’s somewhat patronising reference to them, we first determined to ascertain what the views and aims of the Diggers really were. Its perusal convinced us, and our subsequent investigations have on

The Law of Freedom ( continued ) “After that the necessity of a People in a Parish, in a County and in a Land, hath moved the People to choose Officers to preserve common peace, the same necessity causeth the People to say to their Officers— Do you see our Laws observed for our common preservation, and we will assist and protect you. “These words, assist and protect , implies the rising of the People by force of arms to defend their Laws and Officers, who rule well, against any invasion, insurre

The Law of Freedom ( concluded ) Charles Mackay. It is in the chapter we have just been considering, the fourth chapter of “The Law of Freedom,” that we find Winstanley’s last recorded utterances on cosmological and theological problems. Nothing seems to us more strikingly to show the broadening and development of his powerful mind than a comparison of the views here expressed with those contained in his earlier writings on the subject. True, the underlying ideas are practically the same: he sti

“While God gave to man a capacity to labour, He also gave him a right to the object (the earth) on which that labour must be employed to produce the necessaries of life. This gift of God is to all men alike. No compact or consent or legislation on the part of one portion of the community, can ever justly deprive another portion of the community of their right of their share of the earth, and of its natural productions. No arrangement or agreement or legislation of men now dead, can justly depriv

Introduction. To the Christian Reader, Peace and the Grace of God through Christ,—There are many Anti-Christians who now take occasion to libel the Gospel on account of the assembled peasantry, saying these be the fruits of the New Gospel, to obey none, to raise rebellion in all places, to rush to arms to reform, to root out, and perhaps to destroy all spiritual and temporal authority. All such godless and wicked judgements the Articles here written do answer; in the first place, so that the sha

The statement that toleration was the one leading principle of Cromwell’s life, may seem somewhat exaggerated to those who have not carefully studied his career. By his own words let him be judged. Writing to Major Crawford as early as March 1643 (1644) he plainly tells him—“Sir, the State, in choosing men to serve it, takes no notice of their opinions; if they be willing faithfully to serve it, that satisfies.” After Naseby, under date June 14th, 1645, in his dispatch to the Speaker, he tells t

1. The bare letter of the Law established by Act of Parliament shall be the Rule for Officers and People, and the chief Judge of all actions. 2. He or they who add or diminish from the Law, excepting in the Court of Parliament, shall be cashiered his Office, and never bear Office more. 3. No man shall administer the Law for Money or Reward. He that doth shall die as a Traitor to the Commonwealth. For when Money must buy and sell Justice, and bear all the sway, there is nothing but Oppression to

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