[The Life of John Milton, Volume 5 (of 7), 1654-1660 by David Masson]@TWC D-Link bookThe Life of John Milton, Volume 5 (of 7), 1654-1660 CHAPTER I 95/295
The Court of Madrid had already recalled him, laid an embargo on all English property in Spain, and conferred a Marquisate and pension on the Governor of Hispaniola.
On the 24th of October the Treaty of Peace and Commerce between Cromwell and Louis XIV.
was finally signed; and within a few days afterwards there was out in London an elaborate document entitled "_Scriptum Domini Protectoris, ex consensu atque sententia Concilii sui editum, in quo hujus Reipublica causa contra Hispanos justa esse demonstratur_" ("The Lord-Protector's Manifesto, published with the consent and advice of his Council, in which the justice of the Cause of this Commonwealth against the Spaniards is demonstrated").
Now, accordingly, the Commonwealth entered on a new era of her history. Cromwell and Mazarin were to be fast friends, and the Stuarts were to have no help or countenance any more from the French crown; while, on the other hand, there was to be war to the death between the Commonwealth and Spain, war in the new world and war in the old, and Spain was thus naturally to adopt the cause of Charles II., and employ exiled English Royalism everywhere as one of her agencies,--Of the consciousness of the Lord-Protector and the Council of this increased complexity of the foreign relations of the Commonwealth in consequence of the rupture with Spain there is a curious incidental illustration.
"That several volumes of the book called _The New Atlas_ be bought for the use of the Council, and that the Globe heretofore standing in the Council Chamber be again brought thither," had been one of the Council's instructions to Thurloe at their meeting of Oct.2.Thenceforth, doubtless, both the Globe and the Atlas were to be much in request .-- More important, however, than such fixed apparatus in the Council Room was the moving instrumentality of envoys and diplomatists in the chief European cities and capitals. Above all, an able ambassador in Paris was now an absolute necessity. Nor was the fit man wanting.
<<Back Index Next>> D-Link book Top TWC mobile books
|