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The Cromwellian Protectorate and the languages of empire*

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  25 March 2010

David Armitage
David Armitage
Affiliation:
Emmanuel College, Cambridge
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Abstract

This article recovers some of the classical, constitutional, and religious languages of empire in early-modern Britain by a consideration of the period between the end of the first Anglo-Dutch war in 1654 and the calling of the second Protecloral Parliament in 1656. It examines in particular the strategic and political motivationsfor CromweWs ‘western design’ against the Spanish possessions in the Caribbean and presents the response to thefailure of the design and the oppositiorud literature published around the second Protectoral Parliament as the immediate context for the publication of James Harrington's Oceana (1656). It is argued that Harrington's Machiavellian meditation on imperialism is intended as a critique of the expansion of the British republic, so placing Harrington more firmly within the oppositiorud bloc of the late Protectorate. A concluding section details the recovery of this moment of historical argument in the heat of the opposition to Sir Robert Walpole during the early stages of Anglo-Spanish hostility in 1738—9, and leads to some wider refUctions both on the ideological uses of history in the aeation of the British empire and on the centrality of the languages of empire to an understanding of Anglo-American intellectual history up to the late eighteenth century.

Type
Articles
Information
The Historical Journal , Volume 35 , Issue 3 , September 1992 , pp. 531 - 555
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 1992

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References

1 The Nicholas papers, II: Jan., 1653 – June, 1655, ed. Warner, George F. (Camden Soc. n.s. L (London, 1892)), p. 324 (earl of Norwich to Sir Edward Nicholas, 4 June 1655)Google Scholar.

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11 This paper is accordingly meant as a detail from a larger portrait of the ideological origins of the British empire on which I am engaged.

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13 Ibid. ‘Neptune to the common-wealth of England’, unsigned page opposite frontispiece.

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10 These notes are reprinted in The Clark papers, III, ed. Firth, C. H. (London, Camden Society, 1899), pp. 203–8Google Scholar. Doubt has been cast on their accuracy and veracity by Peter Gaunt who notes that Montagu was not present at the council meeting of 20 July 1654, and that the order-books record no meeting on 20 April 1654: , Gaunt, ‘“The single person's confidants and dependants”? Oliver Cromwell and his protectoral councillors’, Historical Journal, XXXII (1989), p. 550, and n. 35Google Scholar. The enterprise was first called ‘the Western design’ on 5 June 1654 (Calondar of slate papers (domestic) (1654), p. 201).

20 Ibid. pp. 205, 207–8. On Cromwell's providentialism, see Worden, Blair, ‘Providence and politics in Cromwelliam England’. Past and Present, CIX (1985), 55–99CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

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27 TSP, m, 61. Gage was sent as a chaplain on the West India expedition of 1655, and his The English-American his travail by sea and land (London, 1648) was republished as A new survey of the West-Indus in the same year, accompanied by an advertisement in Mtratrius Poltttcus (hereafter, MP), 24–31 M a v 1655 P. 5372Google Scholar.

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31 Burnet, Gilbert, History of his own tine (6 vols., Oxford, 1833), 1, 137–8Google Scholar.

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33 Abbott, III, 538.

34 , Venables, Narrative, p. 6Google Scholar.

35 Ibid. App. D, p. 130; cf. App. E, p. 152.

36 Calendar of state papers (domestic) (1655), p. 204.

37 HMC, 7U1 report, p. 573.

38 I.S., Brief and perfect journal, pp. 19–20Google Scholar; Penn, Granville, Memorials of.. Sir William Penn, II, 98Google Scholar.

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43 Peter Julius Coyet to Charles X, 28 Sept. 1655, in Roberts, Michael (trans, and ed.) Swedish diplomats at CromwelFs court 1655–1656 (Camden Society, 4th Series, XXXVI (London, 1988)), 166–7Google Scholar. Cf. Sagredo, the Venetian ambassador, to the Doge, 28 Sept./8 Oct. 1655 (CSP, Venetian (1655–6), p. 119): ‘It is publicly stated that the ill success of the enterprise was due more to the decision to attempt it…than to irregularities in carrying it out’.

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50 Cromwell lo Coodmn. [30] Oct. 1655: Abbou, III, 859–60.

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52 , Josselin, Diary, p. 350 (3 08 1655)Google Scholar.

53 A dialogue… contenting the present designe in the West Indus, p. 14. The sin of Achan had explanatory and cautionary uses in later British engagements with Spain, e.g. A Utterfromthe commission of the general assembly of the Church of Scotland to the honourable council and inhabitants of the Sects colony ofCaledonia in America (Glasgow, 1699), p. 4Google Scholar(the Scots Darien expedition) and [Towgood, Micaiah,] Spanish cruelty and injustice a justifiable plea for a vigorous war with Spain (London, 1741), pp. 32–3 (the War of Jenkins's Ear)Google Scholar.

54 For Cromwell as Joshua in 1655–6, see e.g. Smith, George, God's unchangeaUeness (London, 1655) (E824.4; 15 Jan. 1655), p. 41Google Scholar, and Phillips, John (trans.), The tears of the Indians (London, 1656) (E1586.1; 9 Jan. 1656)Google Scholar, sig. A4r, and references below.

55 A declaration of his Highness, inviting the p*opU oj England to a day of solemn fasting and humiliation (London, [14 March] 1656) (669X20.25)Google Scholar, broadsheet.

56 Correspondence of Roger Williams, II, 448: Williams to John Winthrop, 21 Feb. 1655/6. This is the first hint that the failure of the western design would be connected with the issue of Cromwell's kingship: , Worden, ‘Oliver Cromwell and the sin of Achan’, pp. 141–5Google Scholar, argues that the failure of the western design contributed to Cromwell's failure to take the crown.

57 , Vane, A healing question (London, 1656) (E879.5; 12 May 1656), p. 1Google Scholar.

58 ‘H. Vane… wrote his discourse entituJed A Healing Question but for touching upon (the Noli me ungere) state sins H.V. went prisoner to Carisbrook Castle in the He of Wight’: Correspondence of Roger Williams, II, 704: Williams to John Leverett, 11 10 1675Google Scholar.

59 A healing question, pp. 4, 14–15, 3. 23–4.

60 On the attempted anti-Protectoral alliance see , Capp. Fifth Monarchy nun, p. 115Google Scholar; , Jacob, Boylt and the English revolution, p. 129Google Scholar. The war against Spain, and the Hispaniola defeat, were defended against Vane's strictures in the army pamphlet, A Ltter from a person in the country to his friend in the city: giving his judgment upon a book entituled a healing question (n.p., 1656) (E885.8; 16 Aug. 1656, though dated 14 June 1656), p. 23.

61 H[awkr], M[ichacl], The right of dominion and property of liberty (London, 1656) (E1636.1; 16 Jan. 1656), sig. AarGoogle Scholar; title-page; pp. 2, 3–4; 41; 50; 83; 86; 89; 90; 93. On Hawke, see Raab, Felix, The English face of Mathiaitllt (London, 1964, pp. 113, 137, 140–4Google Scholar; Zagorin, Perez, A history of political thought in the English revolution (London, 1954, pp. 93–4Google Scholar; Skinner, Quentin, ‘History and ideology in the English revolution’, Historical Journal, VII (1965), 166 and n. 2Google Scholar.

62 See Pinckney, Paul Jan, ‘A Cromwellian parliament: the elections and personnel of 1656’ (Unpub. PhD diss., Vanderbilt, 1962Google Scholar;, esp. chs. u and Vii.

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67 England's remembrancers (London, 1656) (E884.5; 1 Aug. 1656)Google Scholar, sig. A[I]r, A[4]v. Thomason's copy is marked, ‘scattered about the streets’; see also , Capp. Fifth Monarchy men, p. 118Google Scholar, for nationwide distribution.

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70 Abbott, IV, 260; 261–2; 264; 269.

71 A transcript of registers of the Worshipful Company of Stationers; from 1640–1708 A.D. (3 vob., London, 1913), n, 86; MP, 29 Oct.–6 Nov. 1656, p. 7362 (advertisement for publication).

72 Though J. G. A. Pocock has noted the timing, he makes no causal connection: Harrington, Works, p. 14. Only Harlow, V. T., The character of British imperialism (London, 1939), pp. 15–16Google Scholar, and Koebner, Richard, Empire (Cambridge, 1961), p. 66Google Scholar, have made any link between the western design and Oceana.

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74 Ibid. p. 14.

75 Harrington, James, The common-wealth of Octane (London, 1656) (hereafter, Oceana)Google Scholar, sig. [A 3]r; Works, p. 156.

76 Oceana, pp. 27, 36; Works, pp. 185, 193. The works are Hobbes, Thomas, Six lessons to the professors of Mathematics (London, 1656)Google Scholar, dedication dated 10 June 1656; and , J.S., Syllogologia, a historical discourse of parliaments… (London, 1656)Google Scholar(E1646.1; 14 June 1656).

77 Oceana, sig. [A4]v; Works, p. 7. For a bibliographical analysis of Oceana's publication, see Feather, John ‘The publication ofJames Harrington's Commonwealth of Oceana’, The library, XXXII (1977). 262–8CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

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79 Discorsi, 1, vi: ‘… a molte che la ragione non t'induce, t'induce la ntctssita; talmcnte che avendo ordinata una republica atta a mantenersi non ampliando, c la ntctssita la conduccsse a ampliarr, si verrebbe a tor via i fondamcnti suoi ed a faria rovinarc piii tosto’ (Niccoló , Maehiavelli, Open, ed. Bonfantini, Mario (Milan, 1954), p. 109Google Scholar: my emphasis). Trans. D[acres], E[dward], Siachiauls discounts (London, 1636), p. 35Google Scholar. For a discussion of this passage, see , Pocock, The Mathiavelliain moment, pp. 197–99Google Scholar.

80 See especially Harris, G. L.. ‘Medieval doctrines in the debates on supply, 1610–1629’, in Faction and parliament, ed. Sharpe, Kevin (London, 1985), pp. 73–103Google Scholar, and John Guy, ‘The “imperial crown” and the liberty of the subject: the English constitution from Magna Carta to the Bill of Rights' (unpublished paper). My thanks to Professor Guy for a copy of this paper.

81 Abbott, iv, 261.

82 An appeale from the court to the country. Made by a member of parliament lawfully chosen, but secluded illegally by my Lord Protector (London, 1656) (E891.3; 27 Oct. 1656), p. 5Google Scholar; A narrative of the late parliament (so called) (London, 1657) (E935.5; Feb. 1658), p. 30Google Scholar; the MS note in the Folger copy of A book of the continuation of forreign passages (London, 1657) (Folger B3716), p. 60Google Scholar: ‘All Rebellion proceeds from pretences of Religion and Reformation. Necessity is their sanctuary for sin, which themselves make, endorsing that maxim in Livy, Bellum justum, quibus necessarium. It was anciently the maxim of Rome pagan: and is at the present of the Turks and Dutch, never of the Christians’ (referring to the description of the Spanish War as ‘just and necessary’: the quotation is from Livy, ix, 1, cit. Machiavelli, Principe, XXVI); Firth, C. H., The lastyears of the Protectorate (2 vols., London, 1909), 1, 9–10Google Scholar, n. 1.

83 Abbott, IV, 262.

84 Oceana, p. 258; Works, p. 323. The quotation paraphrases Cicero, Di Officiis, II, 27.

85 Froude, J. A., Oceana; or England and her colonies (London, 1886), pp. 1–4Google Scholar; Shklar, Judith, ‘Ideology-hunting: the case of James Harrington’, Amtr. Pol. Se. Rev., LIII (1959), 677–8Google Scholar; Fink, Z. S., The classual republicans (Evanston, 1962), pp. 188–9Google Scholar; Hill, Christopher, The experience of dtftat (London, 1984). p. 206Google Scholar.

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87 The best account of the origins or the war is Woodfinc, Philip, ‘The Anglo-Spanish War of 1739’. in Black, Jeremy (ed.), The origins of war in tarty modern Europe (Edinburgh, 1987), pp. 185–209Google Scholar; see also Hertz, G. B., ‘The war fever of 1739’ in British imperialism in the eighteenth century (London, 1908)Google Scholar; and Wilson, Kathleen, ‘Empire, trade, and popular politics in Hanoverian Britain: the case of Admiral Vernon’, Past and Present, CXXI (1988), 74–109CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

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91 Popular prejudices against the convention and treaty with Spain (London, 1739), pp. 6–7Google Scholar. Sec also Strenuous motivesfor an immediate war against Spain (London, 1738), p. 19Google Scholar; [George, Lord Lyttelton], Farther considerations upon the present state of affairs… in a letter to a minister (London, 1739), p. 24Google Scholar; Ministerat prejudices in favour ofthe convention, examin'd and answer'd (London, 1739), pp. 15, 16–17Google Scholar; Reasons for giving encouragement to the sea-faring people of Great-Britain, in times of peace or war (London 1739) P 15Google Scholar, and [Oldmixon, Jonn,] The history and life of Robert Blake (London, [1740]), p. 86Google Scholar.

92 , Skinner, ‘History- and ideology in the English revolution’, p. 178Google Scholar.

93 John Adams and Jonathan Sewall [sc. Daniel Leonard], Novanglus and Massachustttensis; or political essays (Boston, 1819), pp. 83–84Google Scholar.

94 Ibid. p. 84.

95 James Madison, Alexander Hamilton, and Jay, John, Thefederalist papers, ed. Kramnick, Isaac (Harmondsworth, 1987), p. 87Google Scholar(number 1, ‘Introduction’); the uneasy marriage of ‘republic’ and ‘empire’ after the American revolution is the subject of the final chapter of , Pocock, The Machiavellian moment: see especially pp. 528–31Google Scholar.