Page:Works of Thomas Carlyle - Volume 06.djvu/350

316 upon us at that day. Out of which we saw no way else to extricate ourselves.

‘Accordingly we did agree to meet at Windsor Castle about the beginning of Forty-eight. And there we spent one day together in prayer; inquiring into the causes of that sad dispensation,’—let all men consider it; ‘coming to no farther result that day; but that it was still our duty to seek. And on the morrow we met again in the morning; where many spake from the Word, and prayed; and the then Lieutenant-General Cromwell,’—unintelligible to Posterity, but extremely intelligible to himself, to these men, and to the Maker of him and of them,—‘did press very earnestly on all there present to a thorough consideration of our actions as an Army, and of our ways particularly as private Christians: to see if any iniquity could be found in them; and what it was, that if possible we might find it out, and so remove the cause of such sad rebukes as were upon us (by reason of our iniquities, as we judged) at that time. And the way more particularly the Lord led us to herein was this: To look back and consider what time it was when with joint satisfaction we could last say to the best of our judgments, The presence of the Lord was amongst us, and rebukes and judgments were not as then upon us. Which time the Lord led us jointly to find out and agree in; and having done so, to proceed, as we then judged it our duty, to search into all our public actions as an Army afterwards. Duly weighing (as the Lord helped us) each of them, with their grounds, rules, and ends, as near as we could. And so we concluded this second day, with agreeing to meet again on the morrow. Which accordingly we did upon the same occasion, reassuming the consideration of our debates the day before, and reviewing our actions again.

‘By which means we were, by a gracious hand of the Lord, led to find out the very steps (as we were all then jointly convinced) by which we had departed from the Lord, and provoked Him to depart from us. Which we found to be those cursed carnal Conferences our own conceited wisdom,