Fifth Monarchists
The
Fifth Monarchists or
Fifth Monarchy Men were active from
1649 to
1661 during the
Interregnum, following the
English Civil Wars of the
1600s. They took their name from a belief in a world ruling kingdom to be established by a returning
Jesus in which the year
1666 and its numerical relationship to a passage in the
Biblical Book of Revelation indicating the end of earthly rule by carnal human beings. They were one of a number of
nonconformist dissenting groups that emerged around this time.
1649 was a year of great social unrest in England. The Parliamentary victors of the
First English Civil War failed to negotiate a constitutional settlement with the defeated King
Charles I. Members of Parliament and the
Grandees in the
New Model Army, when faced with Charles's perceived duplicity, reluctantly
tried and executed him.
Government through the King's
Privy Council was replaced with a new body called the
Council of State. Due to fundamental disagreements within a weakened Parliament, this new body was dominated by the Army. There was a considerable political ferment in the country, much of it religiously conditioned, and no lack of proposals for alternative forms of government to replace the old order. These ranged from Royalists who wished to place King
Charles II on the throne, to men like
Oliver Cromwell, who wished to govern with a Parliament voted in by an electorate determined by property ownership, similar to that enfranchised before the civil war, to the
Levellers, influenced by the writings of
John Lilburne, who wanted parliamentary government based on an electorate constituted of every male head of household, through to other groups with smaller followings like the
Fifth Monarchists,
Diggers, the
Ranters, and the
Society of Friends (Quakers).
These were not political parties as that term is understood today, but groups clustered around one or more beliefs, some of the believers attaching themselves to more than one group. Although the pre-war establishment had been split by the Civil War, both of the opposing main factions regarded all radical groups as agitators for change, and they are described as such in the
Historical Collections of
John Rushworth that document events of the early period, and by the
Journals of the House of Commons which cover the period of the Republic itself.
The
Fifth Monarchists were a group of believers in a geopolitical theory which maintained that four other world rulers had already come and gone according to the prophecies of the biblical
Book of Daniel (2: 44). This text recounts a prophetic dream by
Nebuchadnezzar, in which the previous empires had been
Assyrian;
Persian;
Grecian and
Roman, The last empire, they concluded, would be established by the returning Jesus as King of kings and Lord of lords to reign with his saints on earth for a thousand years. The
Fifth Monarchists saw themselves as those saints of that soon to be dawning
millennium. Among prominent Fifth Monarchists were
Thomas Harrison,
Christopher Feake,
Vavasor Powell,
John Carew and
John Rogers.
Fifth Monarchists believed that the timing of the events of the Interregnum were significant because the calendar year of
1666 loomed large on the near horizon. The number
666 had been identified in the
Biblical Book of Revelation with the ultimate human
despot to rule the world, but who would be replaced by the
second coming of Jesus as the
Messiah, it only added to the belief that the Fifth Monarchy was about to begin.
A number of
Fifth Monarchists took a leading part in the events of the time. Thomas Harrison and John Carew were
Commissioners (Judges) at the trial of Charles I and signed the death warrant. Following Charles' death, Oliver Cromwell set up the Commonwealth as a more pure form of government and to replace the already existing monarchy. Cromwell had not intended it, but not too long after establishing the Commonwealth, he dismissed the Parliament, and in effect, became a military dictator. The Fifth Monarchists were also a significant opponent to the Rump Parliament and leading Fifth Monarchists like Vavasor Powell were annoyed at the Rump's failure to renew certain pieces of legislation, such as the Propagation of the Gospel in Wales, because they believed that the Rump was not fulfilling what the Fifth Monarchists perceived to be its aim, that is to turn England into a more 'godly' nation. Leading Fifth Monarchists also had an influence on Oliver Cromwell, as it was Thomas Harrison's idea to introduce the Nominated Assembly(Barebone's Parliament) as a body of religious men. However this was not completely the case as a large proportion of the assembly were conservative-minded gentry like Sir Anthony Ashley-Cooper. This influence on Cromwell did not last however, as just six months after he had created the Nominated Assembly, Cromwell dissolved it in favour of Lambert's more conservative Instrument of Government.
After the forcible dissolution of the
Rump Parliament by Oliver Cromwell, the
Grandees of the Army
Council of Officers were reluctant to authorise free elections because they were aware that the members returned by the traditional constituency would return Presbyterians and Royalist as well as their own sympathisers. They were not at all sure that the majority would be any more compliant than the Rump. Major-General
Thomas Harrison, who had commanded the troop which aided Oliver Cromwell in dissolving the Rump, suggested that there be a ruling body based upon the Old Testament
Sanhedrin of 70 selected "Saints", which was based on his beliefs, as a Fifth Monarchist, that the rule of the Saints would usher in the reign of Christ on Earth. A modified version of this proposal was accepted by Cromwell and the Council of Officers and less than a month after the dissolution of the Rump, during May 1653, letters in the name of the Lord-General and the Army Council were sent to Congregational churches in every county in England to nominate those they considered fit to take part in the new government. The total number of nominees was one hundred and forty, one hundred and twenty nine from England, five from Scotland and six from Ireland.
The arrest of Feake and Powell, two of the most violent of their number, was sufficient for a time to dampen their ardour, but many of the delegates to the
Nominated Assembly of Saints, or as its detractors called the "
Barebones Parliament" after one of the members
Praise-God Barebones, were from congregations with Fifth Monarchist sympathies. The assembly which met from July until December 1653, was the high water mark of Fifth Monarchist influence on national politics. Fearing their ultra-radical ideas, which crystallised in an attack on
tithes, the conservative faction led by Major-General
John Lambert, supported by the use of troops to deny access to the radical factions, engineered a vote for the dissolution of the assembly, which was passed on
December 12, 1653. The collapse of the radical consensus which had spawned the Nominated Assembly led to the
Grandees passing the
Instrument of Government in the
Council of State which paved the way for Cromwell's
Protectorate. The Fifth Monarchist were horrified at the establishment of Cromwell's Protectorate and plotted to overthrow the regime. Two plots were uncovered and broken up in
1657 and
1659.
After the
Restoration on
October 14,
1660 Major-General
Thomas Harrison was the first person to be found guilty of the
regicide of
Charles I. He had been
the seventeenth of fifty nine commissioners (judges) to sign the death warrant of the king in
1649. He was the first regicide to be
hanged, drawn and quartered because he was considered by the new government to still represent a real threat to the re-established order. This threat was realised when on
January 6,
1661, 50 Fifth Monarchists, headed by a wine-cooper named
Thomas Venner, made an effort to attain possession of London in the name of "King Jesus." Most of the fifty were either killed or taken prisoner, and on
January 19 and
21, Venner and ten others were hanged, drawn and quartered for high
treason.
The failure of Venner's Rising led to repressive legislation to suppress non-conformist sects. Although some physical events such as the
Great Plague of London and the
Great Fire of London continued to encourage belief in "the end of the world" ruled by carnal human beings; the doctrine of the sect either died out, or became merged in a milder form of
Millenarianism.
*
Religion in the United Kingdom*
English Dissenters*
John Lilburne*
Gerrard Winstanley*
17th century denominations in England*
Fifth Monarchists or Fifth Monarchy Men*
THE TIMES OF STEPHEN MUMFORD See the sections on "John James", "Efforts at Conformity" and "Fifth Monarchy Views".
Fifth Monarchy Men: Study in Seventeenth Century English Millenarianism by Bernard Capp ISBN 057109791X
