Notes to Chapter 147 In Aphorisms Political (London, 1659), nos. 37 and 38, 4–5, Harrington paraphrases
Milton, but does not mention him by name.
48 That sentiment was often repeated. In A Short Discourse (London, 1659, c. June 15) the
author reads the recent interruptions as God’s means to purge and purify his people, and
urgently warns the restored MPs against corruption and against a “persecuting spirit,”
since the Kingdom of Christ to come is to embody all his Saints.
49 A Publick Plea Opposed to a Private Proposal (London, 1659, c. May 18), title page, 3. The
referent of Milton’s phrase is disputed; some (e.g. Wolfe and Woolrych) think it per-
tains to the entire period of Cromwell’s Protectorate; others (e.g. Masson, Fallon, and
Corns) only to the three-week interregnum between the dissolution of Richard’s par-
liament and the return of the Rump. Hunter suggests the eight months of Richard’s
Protectorate. See the survey in Woolrych, “Introduction,” CPW VII, 85–7.
50 For the Levellers see, for example, Samuel Duncon, Several Proposals Offered to the Con-
sideration of the Keepers of the Liberties of the people of England (London, 1659, c. July 6). In
An Essay toward Settlement upon a sure foundation, being a testimony for God in this perilous
time by a few who have been bewailing their own abominations (London, 1659, September 19,
broadside), Overton and 19 other signers denounce the “haughty and abusive spirit,
found in the late Single Person,” and would prohibit all his supporters from places of
power unless they were truly repentant. See also Christopher Feake, The Fifth Monar-
chy, or Kingdom of Christ, in Opposition to the Beast’s, asserted (London, 1659, c. August
23).
51 Harrington’s tracts of these weeks include A Discourse, Shewing that the spirit of parlia-
ments with a Council in the intervals, is not to be trusted for a Settlement (London, 1659, c. July
28); Politicaster: or, A comical discourse in answer unto Mr. Wren’s Monarchy Asserted, against
Mr. Harrington’s Oceana (London, 1659, August); and Aphorisms Political. Other tracts
promoting his program include A Proposition in Order to the Proposing of a Commonwealth
or Democracie (London, 1659, c. June 14); A Common-Wealth or Nothing; or, Monarchy and
Oligarchy prov’d parallel in tyranny (London, 1659, c. June 14); A Commonwealth, and
Commonwealths-men, Asserted and Vindicated (London, 1659, c. June 28); and A Model of
a Democraticall Government (London, 1659, c. August 31).
52 John Aubrey, Brief Lives, ed. Oliver Lawson Dick (London, 1949), 125, dates the incep-
tion of the Rota Club from the beginning of Michaelmas Term. Other members in-
cluded the erstwhile Leveller John Wildman, Henry Neville, Samuel Pepys, and William
Petty the mathematician.
53 In their Derby Petition of September 22 they declared “God... [has] given a Spirit to
the Army fixed and faithful to the Interest of his people, and our good Cause” and
called for a Select Senate, payment of their arrears, appointment of Fleetwood as per-
manent commander-in-chief, and a guarantee that no officer or soldier would be dis-
missed except by court-martial. Reprinted in The Humble Representation and Petition of
the Officers of the Army to the Parliament (London, 1659, c. October 5). See also Edmund
Ludlow, Memoirs, ed. C. H. Firth, 2 vols (Oxford, 1894), II, 99–148.
54 Considerations upon the late transactions and proceedings of the Army, in reference to the Disso-
lution of the Parliament (London, 1659, c. October 20).
55 The figure indicates that the reduction in salary ordered on April 17, 1655 had been
mostly reversed. See chapter 10, p. 329.
56 For example, The Parliaments Plea: Or XX Reasons for the Union of the Parliament and
Notes to Chapter 11