Better the devil you know - Section15a Part43c

(After a few drinks one night, Oliver Cromwell and Fairfax discuss "legacy issues")

Fairfax: So, Ollie, what now? Where do we go from here?

Cromwell: Where do we go? We don’t go anywhere. I’m running the show now.  And I’m not into this, “Carry forward the revolution” thing.  Bit of order is what we need right now, I reckon.

Fairfax: Yeah, right. Of course, Ollie. I’m right with you there. But I was thinking, you know, we’ve started something. And I was wondering whether in years, in centuries to come, will all this, this change, still be relevant? What will happen two, three hundred or more years from now? For example, do you think that the peasants will ever get their hands on power?

Cromwell: Peasants? Not if I have anything to do with it, they won‘t. I tell you what, those Levellers… Do they have the any idea what would happen if we let a load of sheep-fondling half-wits decide who’s in charge? Bloody anarchy, that's what. These peasants would vote a dog into Parliament if they were given the right narrative and the animal looked cute enough.

Fairfax: Dog, yeah, right… And what about women, Ol? Do you reckon there'll ever be birds in parliament?

Cromwell: Women? Are you having a laugh? Who the hell would want women in Parliament? They already try to run our lives enough as it is. They’d come in and want to ‘smarten the place up’…  encourage us to ‘be in touch with our ‘feminine sides', but just end up giving us more grief. The thought of it!

Fairfax: I don‘t know… ‘Cromwell’s Cuties’… might brighten this place up.

Cromwell: Don’t even go there.

Fairfax: But you reckon that what we’ve achieved will live on? Parliament will go from strength to strength?

Cromwell: Sincerely hope so... As long as Parliamentarians don’t get above themselves, don’t get greedy. As long as they don’t use their power to line their own pockets, to further their own interests. Then I reckon that things'll be fine.

Fairfax: Yeah, right. Last thing we would want, that: Greedy Parliamentarians.

Cromwell: Just think how crap that would look. We put the kybosh on the ‘divine right of kings‘, only to have, couple of hundred years or so down the line, a bunch of chiselling little crooks claiming the ‘divine right of Parliamentarians‘, and filling their boots and taking bribes and saying, “Oooh, you can‘t touch me. I have Parliamentary immunity. I have special privileges, you know."

Fairfax. Yeah, right. That wouldn’t look good, would it?

Cromwell: It wouldn’t look good at all.

Fairfax: Cos, otherwise… you sort of, might as well just invite the monarchy back, have them back running the show, mightn’t you really… you know, when you think about it?

Cromwell: (Contemptuous, dismissive.) Well that isn’t going to happen, is it?

Fairfax: (Nervously) Bloody right, Ollie. Bloody right …Well, at least, I bloody hope not.

Cromwell: Yes… I bloody hope not either.