But while he thus deals with the lamb, let us see how he treats the wolf. We have neither space nor taste for groping through the long and dark labyrinth of Cromwell's proverbial duplicity and audacious apostacy: we shall content ourselves with two facts, which, though stated in the gentlest way by Mr. Macaulay, will abundantly justify the opinion which all mankind, except a few republican zealots, hold of that man's sincerity, of whose abilities, wonderful as they were, the most remarkable, and perhaps the most serviceable to his fortunes, was his hypocrisy; so much so, that South--a most acute observer of mankind, and who had been educated under the Commonwealth and Protectorate--in his sermon on "Worldly Wisdom," adduces Cromwell as an instance of "habitual dissimulation and imposture." Oliver, Mr. Macaulay tells us, modelled his army on the principle of composing it of men fearing God, and zealous for _public liberty_, and in the very next page he is forced to confess that thirteen years followed in which for the first and the last time the civil power of our country was subjected to military dictation.--i. 120. Again, Oliver had made his choice. He had kept the hearts of his soldiers, but he had _broken_ with every other class of his fellow citizens.--i. 129. That is, he had broken through all the promises, pledges, and specious pretences by which he had deceived and enslaved the nation, which Mr. Macaulay calls with such opportune _naïveté, his fellow citizens_! Then follows, not a censure of this faithless usurpation, but many laboured apologies, and even defences of it, and a long series of laudatory epithets, some of which are worth collecting as a rare contrast to Mr. Macaulay's usual style, and particularly to the abuse of Charles, which we have just exhibited. His _genius and resolution_ made him more _absolute master of his country_ than any of her legitimate Kings had been.--i. 129. He having cut off the legitimate King's head on a pretence that Charles had wished to make himself _absolutely master of the country_. Everything yielded to the _vigour and ability_ of Cromwell.--i. 130. The Government, though in the form of a Republic, was in truth a despotism, moderated only by the _wisdom, the sober-mindedness, and the magnanimity_ of the despot.--i. 137. With a vast deal more of the same tone. But Mr. Macaulay particularly expatiates on the influence that Cromwell exercised over foreign states: and there is hardly any topic to which he recurs with more pleasure, or, as we think, with less sagacity, than the terror with which Cromwell and the contempt with which the Stuarts inspired the nations of Europe. He somewhat exaggerates the extent of this feeling, and greatly misstates or mistakes the cause; and as this subject is in the present state of the world of more importance than any others in the work, we hope we may be excused for some observations tending to a sounder opinion on that subject.