" This
instrument is the more deserving of attention, because it points out the
political views which actuated the leaders of the party.[1]
In the army, flushed as it was with victory, and longing for revenge,
maxims began to prevail of the most dangerous tendency in respect of the
royal captive. The politicians maintained that no treaty could be safely
made with the king, because if he were under restraint, he could not be
bound by his consent; if he were restored to liberty, he could not be
expected to make any concessions. The fanatics went still further. They had
read in the book of Numbers that "blood defileth the land, and the land
cannot be cleansed of the blood that is shed therein, but by the blood of
him that shed it;" and hence they inferred that it was a duty, imposed
on them by the God who had given them the victory, to call the king to a
strict account for all the blood which had been shed during the civil
war. Among these, one of the most eminent was Colonel Ludlow, a member of
parliament, who, having persuaded himself that the anger of God could be
appeased only by the death of Charles, laboured, though in vain, to make
Fairfax a convert to his opinion. He proved more successful with Ireton,
whose regiment petitioned[a] the commander-in-chief,
[Footnote 1: Whitelock, 335.
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