The
date of Charles' execution is January 20, 1649.
The Commonwealth was established immediately, and Wales was looked
upon with much distrust--the Presbyterian parts and the Royalist
parts--by the new Government. It was represented in the English
Parliaments, it is true, but its representatives were often English,
and practically appointed by the Government. When the country was
put under the military dictatorship of the major-generals, Harrison
was sent to rule Wales.
Honest attempts were made to give it an efficient clergy; but the
zeal of Vavasour Powel aroused much opposition. Wales either clung
tenaciously to its old religion; or, if it changed it, the changes
were extreme. Though the country generally returned to its old life
and thought at the Restoration in 1660, much of the new life of the
Commonwealth remained: congregations of Independents still met;
Quaker ideals survived all persecution; and even the mysticism of
Morgan Lloyd permeated the slowly awakening thought of the peasants
whom, in his dreams, he saw welcoming the second advent of Christ.
CHAPTER XX--THE GREAT REVOLUTION
Except to the reader who is of a legal or antiquarian turn of mind,
the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries are the least interesting in
the history of Wales--the very centuries that are the most glorious
and the most stirring in the history of England.
Pages:
81
82
83
84
85
86
87
88
89
90
91
92
93
94
95
96
97
98
99
100
101
102
103
104
105