In other words, it had been carried by a majority of five that it fell within the province of the House to determine whether the Single-Person element in the Government of the Commonwealth, already introduced somehow as a matter of fact, should be continued.

On this subject the House debated through the rest of that sitting, and the whole of the next, and the next, and the next,--i.e.till Monday, Sept 11.

Bradshaw, Hasilrig, and Scott took the lead for the Republicans, not that they hoped to unseat Cromwell, but that they wanted to assert the paramount authority of Parliament, and convert the existing Protectorship into a derivative from the House then sitting.

Lawrence, Wolseley, Strickland, and others of the Council of State, describable as the ministerial members, maintained the existing constitution of the Protectorate, and pointed out the dangers that would arise from plucking up a good practical basis for mere reasons of theory.

Matthew Hale interposed at last with a middle motion, substantially embodying the Republican view, but affirming the Protectorship at once, and reserving qualification.