Cromwell had attempted more than he could accomplish; and, notwithstanding the splendor which surrounded the new act of the Protectorate, notwithstanding the new rights which were attached thereto, he felt his power and reputation lessened. A little tract was profusely circulated, under this title: "Killing no Murder." The pamphlet was dedicated to Cromwell himself. {270} "To your Highness the honor is due of dying for the people," said the pamphlet, which was attributed to Sexby, "and it will surely be for you, at the last moment of your life, an inexpressible consolation to see how much good you will do in the world by quitting it. Then alone, my Lord, the titles which you now usurp will really belong to you; then you will be the liberator of your country, for you will deliver it from a bondage almost equal to that from which Moses freed the Jews. ... All this we hope from the death of your Highness. ... It is to hasten this great good that I write this tract. ..." Sexby was arrested and placed in the Tower; he died there several months later, thus escaping the punishment which he had so often merited. While the assassination of the Protector was thus openly proposed to the country, as a means of deliverance, the Upper House, which had been recently formed with great difficulty, met in the Commons with considerable jealousy and ill-will. Cromwell had been compelled to place in the former assembly a few of his most faithful adherents; he had summoned thither seven of his former peers: one only responded to the appeal. A friend of Cromwell, Lord Warwick himself, whose son, Mr. Rich, had recently married Lady Francis, youngest daughter of the Protector, refused to take his seat. "I will not," he said, "sit beside the shoemaker Hewson." In vain did Cromwell, on the 25th of January, 1658, open the sitting of Parliament with a speech which began with these decisive words: "My Lords and Gentlemen of the House of Commons;" the Commons refused to give the honorary title of the "other" House, and only accepted communications with the Peers through their own messengers. The members excluded at the opening of Parliament, in 1657, presented themselves to take their seats, and Cromwell no longer thought of excluding them, for they proposed to take the oath to the new constitution. {271} Republican passion gained the ascendant; it had found its former chief, Sir Arthur Haselrig; being summoned to the House of Lords he refused to sit, and returned to take his place in the House of Commons at the head of the opposition.