Lewis H. Berens - The Digger Movement in the Days of the Commonwealth

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"CAPTAIN JOHN GLADMAN TO LORD FAIRFAX.[36:1]
(Slightly Abridged.)

"SIR,--According to your order I marched towards St. Georges Hill
and sent four men before to bring certain intelligence to me; as
they went they met with Mr. Winstanlie and Mr. Everard (which are
the chief men that have persuaded these people to do what they have
done). And when I had enquired of them and of the officers that lie
at Kingston, I saw there was no need to march any further. I cannot
hear that there have been above twenty of them together since they
first undertook the business. Mr. Winstanlie and Mr. Everard have
engaged both to be with you this day: I believe you will be glad to
be rid of them again, especially Everard, who is no other than a
mad man. Sir, I intend to go with two or three men to St. Georges
Hill this day, and persuade these people to leave this employment
if I can, and if then I see no more danger than now I do I shall
march back again to London tomorrow.... Indeed the business is not
worth the writing nor yet taking notice of: I wonder the Council of
State should be so abused with informations....

"JO. GLADMAN.

"KINGSTON, _April 19th, 1649_."

As they had undertaken, Winstanley and Everard duly appeared before
Lord Fairfax at Whitehall, and under date April 20th the following
account of their interview appears in the ponderous pages of Bulstrode
Whitelocke's _Memorial of English Affairs_:[37:1]

"Everard and Winstanley, the chief of those that digged at St.
George's Hill in Surrey, came to the General and made a large
declaration to justify their proceedings.

"Everard said he was of the race of the Jews, that all the
liberties of the people were lost by the coming in of William the
Conqueror, and that ever since the people of God had lived under
tyranny and oppression worse than that of our forefathers under the
Egyptians.

"But now the time of deliverance was at hand, and God would bring
his people out of this slavery, and restore them to their freedom
in enjoying the fruits and benefits of the Earth.

"And that there had lately appeared to him a vision, which bad him
arise and dig and plough the earth, and receive the fruits thereof.

"That their intent is to restore the Creation to its former
condition. That as God had promised to make the barren land
fruitful, so now what they did was to restore the ancient community
of enjoying the fruits of the Earth, and to distribute the benefits
thereof to the poor and needy, and to feed the hungry and to clothe
the naked.

"That they intend not to meddle with any man's property nor to
break down any pales or enclosures, but only to meddle with what
was common and untilled, and to make it fruitful for the use of
man. That the time will suddenly be, when all men shall willingly
come in and give up their lands and estates, and submit to this
community.

"And for all those that will come in and work they should have
meat, drink, and clothes, which is all that is necessary to the
life of man; and that for money, there was not any need of it, nor
of clothes more than to cover nakedness.

"That they will not defend themselves by arms, but will submit unto
authority, and wait till the promised opportunity be offered, which
they conceive to be at hand. And that as their forefathers lived in
tents, so it would be suitable to their condition now to live in
the same: and more to the like effect.

"While they were before the General, they stood with their hats
on; and being demanded the reason thereof, they said, 'Because he
was but their fellow-creature.' Being asked the meaning of that
place, 'Give honour to whom honour is due'; they said that their
mouths should be stopped that gave them that offence."

Whitelocke continues, "I have set down this the more largely
because it was the beginning of the appearance of this opinion; and
that we might the better understand and avoid these weak
persuasions."

"The germ of Quakerism and much else is curiously visible here," is
Carlyle's shrewd comment on the above incident. But as to how far this
account of the views of the Diggers is correct, we shall leave to the
judgement of those who read the pages that are to follow. Though we may
now believe that, save that he placed Norman in the place of the Saxon
Lords, William the Conqueror introduced but few innovations into the
laws and institutions of the country, the very opposite was the accepted
opinion in the days of Winstanley and his associates.[38:1] It may also
be well to mention here that, though Everard's name appears, and first
in order, amongst those who signed the pamphlet, _The True Levellers
Standard Advanced: or, The State of Community opened and presented to
the Sons of Men_, which bears date April 26th, 1649, and to which we
shall presently refer, it does not appear in any of the later
publications of the Diggers. Whether he died about this time or merely
dropped out of the movement, we have not been able to ascertain.

However this may be, Lord Fairfax appears to have been somewhat
impressed by his interview, to which the Diggers themselves always
referred in most cordial terms; for on his way from Guildford to London
the following month, he visited them at their work, of which visit we
take the following account from the pages of a contemporary and
evidently friendly news-sheet, dated May 31st, 1649:[39:1]

"The SPEECHES of Lord General FAIRFAX and the Officers of the Army
to the Diggers at St. George's Hill in Surrey, and the Diggers'
several answers and replies thereunto.

"As his Excellency the Lord General came from Gilford to London, he
went to view the Diggers at St. George's Hill in Surrey, with his
Officers and Attendants. They found about twelve of them hard at
work, and amongst them one Winstanley was the chief speaker.
Several questions were propounded by the Officers, and the Lord
General made a short speech by way of admonition to them, and this
Winstanley returned sober answers, though they gave little
satisfaction (if any at all) in regard of the strangeness of their
action. It was urged that the Commons were as justly due to the
Lords as any other lands. They answered that these were Crown Lands
where they digged, and the King who possessed them by the Norman
Conquest being dead, they were returned again to the Common People
of England, who might improve them if they would take the pains;
that for those who would come dig with them, they should have the
benefit equal with them, and eat of their bread; but they would not
force any, applying to all the golden rule, to do to others as we
would be done unto. Some Officers wished they had no further plot
in what they did, and that no more was intended than what they did
pretend.

"As to the barrenness of the ground, which was objected as a
discouragement, the Diggers answered they would use their
endeavours, and leave the success to God, who had promised to make
the barren ground fruitful. They carry themselves civilly and
fairly in the country, and have the report of sober, honest men.
Some barley is already come up, and other fruits formerly; but was
pulled up by some of the envious inhabitants thereabouts, who are
not so far convinced as to promise not to injure them for the
future. The ground will probably in a short time yield them some
fruit of their labour, how contemptible soever they do yet appear
to be."

Before following the further adventures of the Diggers, as revealed in
the numerous pamphlets they left us, from which alone they can now be
gathered, we deem it best to lay before our readers what we have been
able to ascertain of Gerrard Winstanley's previous life's history and
writings. Behind every movement that has ever influenced the thoughts of
mankind, there is always some master-mind, a Lautze, a Gautama, a Jesus
of Nazareth, a Wiclif, a John Wesley, a Darwin, a Tolstoy, or a Henry
George; and it is in the comparatively unknown Gerrard Winstanley that
we shall find the master-mind, the inspirer and director, of the Digger
Movement. As Gardiner well says, "It is not only by the immediate
accomplishment of its aim that the value of honest endeavour is to be
tested." And the reader's interest in our work may be quickened if we so
far forestall the pages that are to follow as to indicate that not only
were Winstanley's earlier theological writings the source whence the
early Quakers, or the Children of Light, as they at first called
themselves, drew many of their most characteristic tenets and doctrines,
but that the fundamental principles which inspired and animated his
political writings were in all respects identical with those that during
the past quarter of a century have been so honourably associated with
the name of Henry George. We are not here called upon to pronounce
judgement on these principles; but in passing we shall endeavour to
point out how far the demands and doctrines of the Land Reformers of the
Seventeenth Century, as revealed in Winstanley's writings, coincide with
those of their successors in the Twentieth Century. In all cases we
shall, as far as possible, let Gerrard Winstanley speak for himself.

FOOTNOTES:

[34:1] _Clarke Papers_, vol. ii. p. 209. Bulstrode Whitelocke, then
already a member of the Council of State, in his _Memorial of English
Affairs_ (p. 396), under date April 17th, 1649, has an entry referring
to and summarising this letter.

[34:2] That is to say, a week last Sunday, or last Sunday week.

[35:1] _Loc. cit._ vol. ii. p. 210.

[36:1] _Loc. cit._ vol. ii. pp. 211-212.

[37:1] P. 397.

[38:1] A glance at the titles of John Hare's well-known pamphlets, the
work of a learned, prosaic, diffuse, moderate, and loyal writer,
suffices to show how widespread this jealousy and impatience of what he
terms Normanism was. One runs as follows:--"_St. Edwards Ghost or Anti
Normanism_: Being a pathetical Complaint and Motion, in the behalf of
our English Nation, against the grand yet neglected grievance
Normanism." Another, {3}"_Englands Proper and Only Way to an
Establishment in Honor, Freedom, Peace and Happiness_: Or the Norman
Yoke once more uncased, and the Necessity, Justice, and Present
Seasonableness of breaking it in pieces demonstrated, in Eight most
plain and true Propositions, with their proofs." The pamphlets are
interesting only as showing the prevalence of the idea that the
dishonour of the English Nation, and the slavery and impoverishment of
the masses of the English people, were due to Norman Laws and
institutions introduced by William the Conqueror.

[39:1] British Museum, Press Mark, E. 530.

CHAPTER V

GERRARD WINSTANLEY

"Your word-divinity darkens knowledge. You talk of a body of
Divinity, and of Anatomysing Divinity. O fine language! But when it
comes to trial, it is but a husk without the kernel, words without
life. The Spirit is in the hearts of the people whom you despise
and tread under foot."--WINSTANLEY, _The New Law of Righteousness
(1649)_.

Gerrard Winstanley, whose strange entry on the stately stage of English
History we have recorded in the previous chapter, was born at Wigan in
the County of Lancashire, on October 10th, 1609.[41:1] He was,
therefore, some ten years younger than his great contemporary Oliver
Cromwell (born 1599), one year the junior of the immortal Milton (born
1608), and some fifteen years older than George Fox (born 1624). Of his
earlier years we know nothing; but, to judge from many passages in his
writings, he appears to have received a good middle-class education, and
to have been brought up a dutiful follower of the Church as by law
established. When arrived at man's estate, he settled as a small trader
in London, of which City he probably became a freeman; for in a pamphlet
addressed to the City of London,[41:2] he claims to be "one of thy sons
by freedom." He then goes on to relate how, "by thy cheating sons in
the thieving art of buying and selling, and by the burdens of and for
the soldiery in the beginning of the war," he "had been beaten out of
both estate and trade," and had been forced "to accept of the good-will
of friends, crediting of me, to live a country life."

Those who have passed through a similar experience, who have been driven
from the comparatively comfortable middle-class life to the precarious
and comfortless existence of the vast majority of the toiling masses,
will readily realise that under such circumstances Winstanley's mind
would naturally be full of questionings such as might not have forced
themselves on his attention under more prosperous conditions. What was
the aim and object of that incessant struggle out of which he had just
emerged "beaten out of both estate and trade"? What made it necessary?
who really benefited by it? For whose benefit was the war being waged,
the burden of which had fallen so heavily upon him? How was it going to
advantage the masses of the people? Was it ever intended that it should
benefit them? was it possible that it should do so? Could any such
struggle be a means of delivering the great masses of the people, "the
younger brothers," out of the straits of poverty, with its attendant
train of ignorance, misery, vice, and crime, to which they had hitherto
been ruthlessly and hopelessly condemned? Was it, in truth, inevitable,
was it inherent in the very nature of things, was it God's intention
that a privileged few, "the elder brothers," should be lords and
masters, and that the great majority of mankind should for ever remain
the mere hewers of wood and drawers of water, the slaves and servants of
an insignificant minority of their fellow-creatures? Were these things
due to natural causes, to the inscrutable workings of a Divine
Providence; or were they but the necessary though unforeseen fruits of
mere man-made laws and institutions the existing generation had
inherited from a by-gone and ignorant past? Such were the questions
which vaguely and indistinctly may have passed, and, as we shall see,
did pass, through the active, original, philosophic and deeply religious
mind of Winstanley in the quiet solitude of his country life.

His life had drifted from its accustomed moorings; his troubles were
greater than he could bear; and when he turned to Religion for guidance
and consolation, alas! he found that the teachings he had imbibed in his
childhood, and never questioned in his manhood, now failed him in his
hour of need. Foiled, though not beaten, he turned to the pages of the
Holy Scriptures themselves for guidance and information, for consolation
and revelation. In these inspired writings, if anywhere, there surely
must be found some expression, some revelation, of God's intentions
towards His children, some indication of His holy will, which, if men
would wholly follow, would lead them down the path of righteousness to
happiness and peace. And it was from these pages that Winstanley derived
those religious and political convictions that find such eloquent and
forcible expression in his writings, and which he made such heroic
efforts to proclaim by word and deed to his fellow-men.

What seems to us to give a special charm to the study of Winstanley's
writings is that they reveal the gradual development of his acute and
powerful mind. His earlier pamphlets betray the influence of the
mysticism so prevalent in his days; his last utterance on theological
questions, as we shall see, might have been penned by an advanced
thinker of the present day, imbued with modern scientific views, and
recognising the necessary relation and co-ordination of all the physical
and psychical phenomena of the universe, "of the several bodies of the
stars and planets in the heavens above, and the several bodies of the
earth below, as plants, grass, fishes, beasts, birds, and mankind."

As to how far Winstanley owes the views that find expression in his
earlier pamphlets--which deal exclusively with cosmological or
theological speculations--to others, or to the writings of earlier
mystics, we have no means of knowing.[43:1] From them we gather,
however, that he had learned or had come to regard the whole Biblical
narrative as an allegory, of which he gives a most poetical
interpretation. The Creation is mankind. The Garden of Eden is the mind
of man, which he describes as originally filled with herbs and pleasant
plants, "as love, joy, peace, humility, delight, and purity of life."
The serpent he holds to be self-love, the forbidden fruit to be
"selfishness," following the promptings of which "the whole garden
becomes a stinking dunghill of weeds, and brings forth nothing but
pride, envy, discontent, disobedience, and the whole actings of the
spirit and power of darkness." And he argues that--"If the creature
should be honored in this condition, then God would be dishonored,
because his command would be broken.... And if the creature were utterly
lost ... then likewise God would suffer dishonor, because his work would
be spoiled." Hence he maintains that "the curse that was declared to
Adam was temporary," and that eventually the whole creation, the whole
of mankind, shall be saved, and "the work of God shall be restored from
this lost, dead, weedy and enslaved condition."[44:1]

Winstanley, however, regarded the word "God" as too vague satisfactorily
to denote the supreme spiritual power which pervades, upholds and
governs the whole universe. He had, he tells us, "been held in darkness
by that word, as I see many people are."[44:2] And so that neither he
nor others should "rest longer upon words without knowledge, but
hereafter may look upon that spiritual power, and know what it is that
rules them, which doth rule in and over all," he felt himself impelled
to conceive of and to refer to this spiritual power, which is God, as
"Reason." He contends that "though men may esteem the word Reason to be
too mean a name to set forth the Father by, yet it is the highest name
that can be given to Him. For it is Reason that made all things; and it
is Reason that governs the whole Creation. If flesh were but subject
thereunto, that is, to the Spirit of Reason within itself, it would
never act unrighteously.... For this Spirit of Reason is not without a
man, but within every man; hence he need not run after others to tell
him or to teach him; for this Spirit is his maker, he dwells in him, and
if the flesh were subject thereunto, he would daily find teaching
therefrom, though he dwelt alone and saw the face of no other
man."[45:1] "This is the Spirit, or Father, which as he made the Globe
and every creature, so he dwells in every creature, but supremely in
man. He it is by whom everyone lives, and moves, and hath his being.
Perfect man is the eye and face that sees and declares the Father: and
he is perfect when he is taken up in the Spirit and lives in the light
of Reason."[45:1] "Reason is that living Power of Light that is in all
things. It is the salt that savours all things. It is the fire that
burns up dross, and so restores what is corrupted, and preserves what is
pure. He is the Lord our Righteousness. It lies in the bottom of love,
of justice, of wisdom: for if the Spirit Reason did not uphold and
moderate these, they would be madness; nay, they could not be called by
their names, for Reason guides them in order and leads them to their
right end, which is not to preserve a part, but the whole
Creation."[45:2]

The reason of man, Winstanley regarded but as an emanation of the Divine
Spirit Reason, as the one true Inward Light, which if men would only and
wholly follow would lead them to live in peace and harmony, and in
accordance with the Divine Spirit. "Man's reasoning," he says,[45:2] "is
a creature which flows from that Spirit to this end, to draw up man into
himself. It is but a candle lighted by that soul, and this light,
shining through flesh, is darkened by the imagination of the flesh. So
that many times men act contrary to reason, though they think they act
according to Reason.... The Spirit Reason, which I call God, the Maker
and Ruler of all things, is that spiritual power that guides all men's
reasoning in right order, and to a right end ... and knite every
creature together into a oneness, making every creature to be an
upholder of his fellows; and so everyone is an assistant to preserve the
whole. And the nearer man's reasoning comes to this, the more spiritual
they are; the further off they be, the more selfish and fleshy they be."

Winstanley took care to point out,[46:1] however, that "this word Reason
is not the alone name of this spiritual power; but everyone may give him
a name according to that spiritual power that they feel and see rules in
them, carrying them forth in actions to preserve their fellow-creatures
as well as themselves. Therefore some may call him King of
Righteousness, or Prince of Peace; some may call him Love, and the like.
But I can and I do call him Reason, because I see him to be that living,
powerful light that is in righteousness, making righteousness to be
righteousness, or justice to be justice, or love to be love. For without
this moderator and ruler they would be madness; nay, the self-willedness
of the flesh, and not what we call them."[46:1]

But, he warns his readers,[46:2] "truly let me tell you, that you cannot
say the Spirit, Reason, is your God, till you see and feel by experience
that the Spirit doth govern your flesh. For if Envy be the Lord that
rules your flesh, if Pride and Covetousness rule your flesh, then is
Envy, Covetousness, or Pride your God. If you fear man so greatly that
you dare not do righteously for fear of angering men, then slavish fear
is your God. If rash anger govern your flesh, then is anger your God.
Therefore deceive not yourselves, but let Reason work within you; and
examine and see what your flesh is subject to. For whatever doth govern
in you, that is your God."

Winstanley's characteristic theological doctrines were, then, the
realisation of the function and importance of the Inward Light, of
Reason, which he regarded as the necessary and all-sufficient guide for
human conduct; his keen appreciation of silence as the necessary
precursor of all real prayer, if not as in itself a form of worship;
and his intense conviction of the ultimate salvation of the whole of
mankind. To Winstanley, Reason is the Ruling Spirit of the whole
Creation, is God, the Spirit of Righteousness, who is ever seated within
the hearts of men combating the lusts of the flesh, the promptings of
the brute animal nature of mankind. Disobedient man may know him not,
because covetous flesh, the promptings of self-love, hath deceived him,
and "so he looks abroad for a God, and so doth imagine or fancy a God in
some particular place of glory beyond the skies; or else, if men do look
for a God within them, yet are they led by the notions of King Flesh,
and not of King Spirit."[47:1] Reason, in short, is the spark of the
Divine in man, the Spirit of Light that dwells within and may rule the
mind and actions of every man. Conscience is but the promptings of
Reason, inspiring men to right action, to deal justly and brotherly and
to live in peaceful and harmonious association with their fellows.
Self-love, covetousness, the desire of the flesh, is ever the enemy of
Reason. And life is but a continuous struggle between these two powers
for dominion in the Creation, over the hearts and actions of mankind.
Self-love ruling the hearts of man, is the Adam that causes him to sin,
not the crime of the man Adam who lived so many thousand years ago. And
similarly it is the ruling of the spirit of Jesus Christ, the Inward
Light, within the hearts of man, not the sufferings of a man Christ
Jesus, which is the essential condition of individual and social
salvation. "This is the lightning that shall spread from East to West.
This is the Kingdom of Heaven within you, dwelling and ruling in your
flesh. Therefore learn to know Jesus Christ as the Father knows him;
that is, not after the flesh; but know that the Spirit within the flesh
is that mighty man Christ Jesus. He within governs the flesh; he within
laid down the flesh, when he was said to die; he within is to arise, not
at a distance from man, but he will rise up in men, and manifest himself
to be the light and life of every man and woman that is saved by
him."[47:2] By following the desires of the flesh, the promptings of
selfish covetousness, we can never gain true happiness, which is Heaven,
for the voice of Reason within us, of our conscience, or the Inward
Light illumining the inner darkness, will upbraid{4} us and cast us into
Hell within us. True happiness, complete satisfaction, which is Heaven,
can only be gained by following the dictates of Reason, by following the
promptings of the Inward Light. Thus to Winstanley, as to Tolstoy, the
Kingdom of Heaven, as well as the kingdom of hell, is within men's
minds, and "there is no other."[48:1] Everything that happens, however,
is ordained, or rather permitted, by God the Father, "the Ruling Spirit
of the Whole Creation," for His own ends. He controls the Spirits or
Powers we call evil, as well as those we call good: all work in
accordance with His commands, to further His ends. In Winstanley's
philosophy, unlike that of Luther, there was no room for an independent
Devil. Though in our blindness we may attribute our sufferings to such a
personage, yet whatever happens to a man is somehow or other for his own
good, though in an unregenerate state we may not realise this. All
suffering, in truth, does but tend to purify the soul from the lust of
the flesh, to enable the Inward Light to overcome the inward darkness,
to enable Reason to overcome Self-Love, good to overcome evil: and thus
to lead men to God. In the end, in the day of Judgement, the good will
triumph, Reason will cast out Covetousness, Universal Love will cast out
Self Love, meekness will cast out pride, righteousness will cast out
unrighteousness: and all men made perfect by the Inward Light, the
Spirit of Christ within them, will rejoice in the knowledge and glory of
God.

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