“The So-called Council of State” 1649–1652ous left flank, who were alarming Presbyterians and others intent on promoting
religious orthodoxy and morality, as well as men of property, lawyers, and political
leaders worried about government stability. Despite imprisonment and press con-
trols, Levellers continued to publish pamphlets denouncing the government as ille-
gitimate and demanding an Agreement of the People, a representative parliament,
expansion of suffrage, toleration, and reform of the laws, courts, and taxes.^73 More
threatening in principle, though not in fact, were the so called True Levellers or
Diggers, at first only twenty or thirty poor men who set out on April 1, 1649 to
cultivate the waste lands on St George’s Hill and elsewhere in Surrey, as a symbolic
claim to rights in the common lands, and in theory, to all property. Sporadic raids
by landowners culminated a year later in the total destruction of their settlements,
huts, and furniture, but their leader, Gerrard Winstanley, continued to press their
claims in often eloquent manifestos argued from an allegorical exegesis of Genesis
and other biblical texts. Beginning with The True Levellers Standard Advanced (c.
April 26, 1649) and ending with The Law of Freedom in a Platform (c. February 20,
1652) presented to Oliver Cromwell, the Digger tracts projected a utopia based on
Christian communism.^74 Still more alarming, out of all proportion to their scant
numbers, were the Ranters, an antinomian sect whose members believed that God
dwelt in them and by his grace rendered all their acts sinless; some acted out that
belief in open sexual license and nakedness or in blasphemy and swearing – whence
their name. Some Ranter tracts of 1649–50, wildly imagistic, experiential, and
mystical, urged such behavior as evidence of their inner light.^75
The government also feared invasion from Scotland. With the royalists in Ireland
losing badly, Prince Charles came to terms with the Scottish parliament and kirk.
He took the Covenant in May, 1650, promised to establish Presbyterianism in
Scotland and England, accepted the Scottish throne, and prepared to lead an invad-
ing army which, it was supposed, would be supported by royalists and Presbyterians
throughout England. Cromwell was recalled from Ireland where victory was now
assured; he returned on June 1 to great acclaim. The most insightful tribute to him
was Marvell’s tonally complex “Horatian Ode upon Cromwel’s Return from Ire-
land,” which praises Cromwell as a force of nature and destiny who, like a Caesar
back from Gaul, is still (but may not always be) the republic’s good servant: “Nor
yet grown stiffer with Command, / But still in the Republick’s hand.” Marvell’s
poem also recognizes, in Machiavellian terms, the republic’s necessary reliance on
Cromwell’s armed might: “The same Arts that did gain / A Pow’r must it main-
tain.”^76 When the government decided on a preemptive invasion of Scotland, Fairfax
resigned as commander-in-chief, and Cromwell took command on June 26. His
striking victory at Dunbar on September 3, 1650 turned the tide for England, though
the war continued for another year; on September 3, 1651 he won a decisive vic-
tory at Worcester, forcing Scotland into submission and prompting Charles to es-
cape in disguise to France.
Such external and internal dangers forced political compromises that Milton ac-