ABSTRACT
During the eleven years’ tyranny, though the existence of a party had not been notified by any organization or any public action, a group of friends, containing several of the richest peers and highest commoners in England, had formed the habit of living together for months under one roof to watch and discuss events. This home conspiracy, the true origin of our party system, was hatched far from London in deer parks and on garden terraces. The chiefs of the old Court party, who had so long silenced every voice in England but their own, were for ever broken and scattered, many months before the King’s later Cavalier friends had divided their fortunes from those of Warwick and Pym. The financial demands of the Scots Commissioners and the rude persistence with which they now claimed the abolition of Episcopacy in England, had by the end of February lost them all favour with one section of the English patriots.
