In view of such a manifestation of the state of public opinion, we cannot be surprised that Winstanley’s eloquent and impressive appeals awoke a responsive echo in the minds of many who would have shrunk from following his example, or even from publicly avowing his creed.  Moreover, the miserable condition of the masses of the agricultural population, of which we shall give some startling evidence later on, must have prepared a soil favourable to his self-imposed mission, to awaken them to a knowledge both of their rights and of their duties.  Especially welcome must have been doctrines in accordance with their simple religious beliefs, as well as with their ancient and well-founded traditions of certain inalienable rights to the use of the land:  rights that, as they well knew, had been filched from them under cover of laws they had no voice in making, which they did not understand, and which were enforced upon them by the power of the sword and gallows.  We must remember, however, that though the landholders had succeeded in impoverishing, they had not yet succeeded in degrading the people; some remnant of the old English spirit was still left, and the Civil War had re-awakened the old English craving for freedom, liberty, and equity.  The landholders, in their attempt to emancipate themselves from the control of the Crown, had kindled a fire amongst the people before which they quailed; small wonder, then, that about this time they began to wish, to intrigue and to struggle for the re-establishment of the Monarchy.  From the time of Henry the Eighth the condition of the English labourers had steadily worsened; it was left to the landholders after the Restoration to complete their enslavement and degradation.  When considering Winstanley’s or any other similar doctrines, the student would do well to bear in mind Professor Thorold Rogers’ conclusions,[89:1]—­conclusions arrived at after a lifelong study of the question,—­that—­“I contend that from 1563 to 1824, a conspiracy, concocted by the law and carried out by parties interested in its success, was entered into, to cheat the English workmen of his wages, to tie him to the soil, to deprive him of hope, and to degrade him into irremediable poverty.”  Or, as he elsewhere expresses it[89:2]—­“For more than two centuries and a half the English law, and those who administered the law, were engaged in grinding down the English workman to the lowest pittance, in stamping out every expression or act which indicated any organised discontent, and in multiplying penalties upon him when he thought of his natural rights.”

FOOTNOTES: 

[79:1] King’s Pamphlets.  British Museum, Press Mark E 475 (11).

[83:1] King’s Pamphlets.  British Museum, Press Mark, E. 548 (33).

[84:1] King’s Pamphlets.  British Museum, Press Mark, E. 555.