Page:The Leveller movement; a study in the history and political theory of the English Great Civil War (IA levellermovement01peas).djvu/163

 kings and other “Officers of Trust” in the commonwealth. At first this bondage had been maintained by force, but latterly by infusing in the people false principles of kingship, parliaments, and freedom; also by the corruption of the gentry, naturally the strongest prop of the people. The nation had borne with its bondage far longer than it should have done.

If it were admitted that the arbitrary power and injustice then existing was a yoke imposed by the Norman conquest and the usurpation of the king and his creatures the Lords, the question was how to release the commonwealth from its bondage. This was the cause to which Lilburne considered himself a martyr. Overton had some idea of the real difficulty of what must necessarily come