"We have not been now four years and upwards in this government," says the Protector, in one of his speeches, "to be totally ignorant of what things may be of the greatest concernment to us." No; this man has not been an idle scholar. Since the Lord General took the reins of civil government, and became Lord Protector, he has thought and learned much of statemanship. But as a statesman, he is still first of all the Puritan. It is worth while to observe how his foreign policy, which has been justly admired, took its turn and direction from his religious feelings. He made alliances with the Protestant powers of the north, and assumed a firm attitude of hostility towards Spain--and reasons of state may have had some sway in determining him to these measures; but his great motive for hostility with Spain was, that she stood "at the head of the antichristian interest"--"was described in the Scriptures to be papal and antichristian." "Why, truly your great enemy is the Spaniard. He is a natural enemy. He is naturally so throughout, by reason of that enmity that is in him against whatever is of God.... Your enemy, as I tell you, naturally, by that antipathy which is in him,--and also providentially, (that is, by special ordering of Providence.) An enmity is put in him by God. 'I will put an enmity between thy seed and her seed,' which goes but for little among statesmen, but is more considerable than all things. And he that considers not such natural enmity, the _providential_ enmity as well as the _accidental_, I think he is not well acquainted with the Scripture, and the things of God,"--(_Speech_ 5.) In fine, we see in Cromwell, every where and throughout, the genuine, fervid Puritan--the Puritan general, the Puritan statesman. He was a man, and, therefore, doubtless ambitious; he rose through a scene of civil as well as military contest, and, doubtless, was not unacquainted with dissimulation; but if we would describe him briefly, it is as the GREAT PURITAN that he must, ever be remembered in history.