man of falsehoods, but a man of truths; whose words do carry a meaning with them, and above all others of that time are worth considering. His words,—and still more his silences, and unconscious instincts, when you have spelt and lovingly deciphered these also out of his words,—will in several ways reward the study of an earnest man. An earnest man, I apprehend, may gather from these words of Oliver’s, were there even no other evidence, that the character of Oliver, and of the Affairs he worked in, is much the reverse of that mad jumble of ‘hypocrisies,’ etc. etc., which at present passes current as such.
But certainly, on any hypothesis as to that, such a set of Documents may hope to be elucidative in various respects. Oliver’s Character, and that of Oliver’s Performance in this world: here best of all may we expect to read it, whatsoever it was. Even if false, these words, authentically spoken and written by the chief actor in the business, must be of prime moment for understanding of it. These are the words this man found suitablest to represent the Things themselves, around him, and in him, of which we seek a History. The newborn Things and Events as they bodied themselves forth to Oliver Cromwell from the Whirlwind of the passing Time,—this is the name and definition he saw good to give of them. To get at these direct utterances of his, is to get at the very heart of the business; were there once light for us in these, the business had begun again at the heart of it to be luminous!—On the whole, we will start with this small service, the Letters and Speeches of Oliver Cromwell washed into something of legibility again, as the preliminary of all. May it prosper with a few serious readers! The heart of that Grand Puritan Business once again becoming visible, even in faint twilight, to mankind, what masses of brutish darkness will gradually vanish from all fibres of it, from the whole body and environment of it, and trouble no man any more! Masses of foul darkness, sordid confusions not a few, as I calculate, which now bury this matter very deep, may vanish: the heart of this matter
