Oliver Cromwell

Oliver Cromwell is invoked in Thomas Paine’s critique of a Quaker political testimony, not presented through a narrated biography or a sustained account of his rule. Paine uses him as a pointed example: if the rise and fall of governments are exclusively God’s concern, then the Quakers’ own principle would require them to accept Cromwell’s historical ascendancy as divine providence, just as it would require them to accept other changes in government. The reference makes Cromwell a test of the consistency of political quietism.

The reference in Paine’s argument

Paine introduces Cromwell while examining the Quakers’ stated belief that setting up and putting down kings and governments is God’s peculiar prerogative, and that people should not contrive such changes themselves. He presses the implication of that doctrine: if political transformations belong to God, then its adherents cannot selectively object to one ruler or approve another on their own political grounds. Cromwell’s name turns the abstract principle into a historical test.

Cromwell and divine providence

The example forms part of a wider argument that changes in government occur through ordinary human means rather than miracles. Paine notes that kings are not removed by miracles and that political changes likewise come about through common human actions. He invokes Cromwell to show that a doctrine of passive acceptance must encompass past political outcomes as well as those its adherents may favor; the principle cannot be reserved for governments they regard as providential.

Political quietism and American independence

Paine’s target is the gap between the Quakers’ declaration that they should leave the ordering of governments to God and their published appeal for people to unite against writings and measures favoring separation from Great Britain. If they truly abstained from political intervention, he argues, they should wait for events rather than campaign against independence. Cromwell sharpens the challenge: the same principle that makes his rise God’s work also requires the Quakers to refrain from selectively intervening in the present political struggle.

Narrative and argumentative significance

Cromwell remains a brief allusion; the passage supplies no account of his life or actions. His function is rhetorical and theological. By placing his name beside the Quakers’ doctrine, Paine makes their professed noninterference answerable to a concrete historical example, then uses the resulting inconsistency to challenge their opposition to American independence.