Page:The Leveller movement; a study in the history and political theory of the English Great Civil War (IA levellermovement01peas).djvu/127

 with better ones. Members of Parliament should be compelled to abandon their lucrative offices and be paid for their services in Parliament; for it is against justice that legislators hold judicial offices, and thus execute the law as well as make it. It may be alleged that certain members of the Long Parliament such as Cromwell are performing notable service in military commands; but Cromwell’s design for a committee at which anyone oppressed by a Parliament member could find redress, shows that he is capable of even more notable service in his seat in the House of Commons. The radicals differed from the dominating party in maintaining that the victory against the king was to be won not in the field, but in the public opinion of the nation.

In its demand that the war be turned into a democratic crusade against tyranny, England’s Birth-right reminds one of Anti-Cavalierisme. It appeals to the people to rise as one man throughout the kingdom, force the king’s remaining garrisons to surrender, and thus prevent the war from dragging on for another year. Moreover, the rea-