Historical and Political Notes on the Life of Oliver Cromwell

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continues the word: tumultum It is a defect of nature that we become weary of our happiness just as much as our unhappiness, and we often embrace new things with such greed that, forgetting ourselves, we become entangled in snares from which we can only extricate ourselves by cutting them, at the cost of a thousand ransoms original: "Lytro" for souls and the ruin of collapsing cities, and often through the destruction and excision of entire kingdoms. If anyone had observed Britain a few years ago with clear eyes, they would have felt envy nearly born within their own breast. For one could see a more absolute peace of the people, a more fertile yield of commerce, and a more secure safety from the injuries of outsiders (for the sea surrounds the whole island), as well as a wonderful agreement of three very combative peoples under one head, in soil fertility and mildness of air second to none. And, to say much in few words, there was a tranquility of spirit hardly comparable in its total firmness and power, a mild—though almost always predictive of a storm—calm original: "malacia", and, had they not begun to be agitated by their own intemperance, a safe and perpetual happiness.

But just as harmful humors original: "humores" gradually grow in bodies torpid with idle leisure, overwhelming and lulling the mind, and suffocating the spirit with their own abundance, so England, mistress of overly fierce viscera, as if drunk from an influx of all things and entangled in lethargy original: "Veterno", had neglected to expel—by the Catholic purging drum and trumpet—those harmful, turbulent, and needy humors for whom all peace is restless, those drones of others' labor who knew no art of life other than that by which death is sought. She had scorned bloodlettings original: "venæsectiones" and had not looked out for herself sufficiently with preventative remedies. Thence, the body began to be inflated and to swell with contrary humors, to boil over into the head, to have its strength prostrated, and all things began to collide with the greatest stubbornness toward their own destruction, as if by consensus rejecting the power of medicine. The beginning was taken from the suspected religion of the Queen original: "Regina", as if there were no longer any war to which they could not provide either a cause, or a handle, or a pretext-