pp. 704, 705). The parliament was restored on 26 Dec. by the military, and Cooper was appointed one of the temporary commissioners of the army. Until 7 Jan. 1660 he was one of the four to whom the care of the Tower was entrusted. On 2 Jan. a council of state was created, of whom ten were non-parliamentary, and of these he was the first elected. He once more brought up his old claim to sit for Downton, and it was at last allowed. On 7 Jan. he took his seat and subscribed the ‘engagement.’ He also received the colonelcy of Fleetwood's regiment of horse. It was at this time that he is described by Ludlow as ‘a known bitter enemy to the public and to all good men.’ Ludlow also speaks of his ‘smooth tongue and insinuating carriage’ (Christie, vol. i. app. iii. p. lxii). He at once took a leading part in endeavouring to obtain the restitution of the excluded members. Mordaunt wrote of him to Hyde thus: ‘Cooper yet hath his tongue well hung and words at will, and employs his rhetoric to cashier all officers, civil as well as military, that sided with Fleetwood and Lambert.’ Upon Monck's arrival Haselrig summoned those members of the council whom he could trust to meet him, and Cooper, with others of Monck's friends, in vain tried to gain admittance; he endeavoured, too, without success to dissuade the general from obeying the orders given him to dismantle the city. When parliament placed the command of the forces under five commissioners, Cooper's name was proposed, but rejected by 30 to 15. He and others still continued to urge the admission of the excluded members, which took place on 21 Feb., Cooper, as colonel of Fleetwood's regiment, commanding the escort. A new council of state, composed of friends of the Restoration, included his name; and upon Monck being made commander-in-chief, he received a commission as captain of foot in the Isle of Wight (Shaftesbury Papers). There is no evidence to support Wood's statement that he also received a commission from Monck as governor of the Isle of Wight. Cooper now steadily pursued the design of restoring Charles, and copies are preserved of letters from Charles to him dated 27 March and 8 April (ib.) In the Convention parliament he was returned for Wiltshire, and was one of the twelve deputed by the commons to go to Breda to invite Charles to return. On this journey an accident occurred, by the upsetting of his carriage, which caused an internal abscess that was never cured.
Cooper's apparent inconsistencies during the Commonwealth may be explained by his willingness to accept the de facto rule, and his desire for a genuine parliamentary government.
Cooper met the king at Canterbury, and on the nomination of Monck was one of twelve who, though they had fought against the king, were yet, 27 May, placed on the privy council. According to Clarendon (Life, i. 278), ‘it was believed that his slippery humour would be easily restrained and fixed by his uncle,’ Southampton the treasurer. At the head of his regiment he appeared among the troops assembled on Blackheath when the king made his entry into London. He received a formal pardon on 27 June, and further pardons on 10 Feb. and 8 June 1661. Almost his first duty was to examine the prisoners of the anabaptist congregations in the Tower. On 3 June he was called upon to repel, with what success we do not hear, an attack by Prynne, who ‘fell upon’ him for ‘putting his hand to the Instrument’ (Hist. MSS. Comm. 5th Rep. 204 a). On 2 July Prynne seconded a motion for compelling all officers of the protectorate to refund their salaries. Cooper closed the debate with saying that ‘he might freely speak, because he never received any salary; but he looked upon the proviso as dangerous to the peace of the nation, adding that it reached General Monck and Admiral Montague.’ The motion was rejected by 181 to 151. When the debate on religion came on, upon the question of a moderate episcopacy, Cooper, in the court interest, moved and carried that the debate be laid aside, and the committee adjourned for three months. In the debate which followed the third conference between the houses on the Indemnity Bill he urged lenity. On the motion made against Haselrig he ‘was for executing nobody but those who were guilty of the king's blood, and said he thought this man not considerably enough; but moved to put him with the rest.’ When the question arose, on the Bill of Attainder on 4 Dec., as to whether the legacies of Cromwell, Pride, Bradshaw, and Ireton, who had been attainted, should be paid, he moved to allow settlements before marriage, or as far back as 1647, i.e. before the king's death. According to Mrs. Hutchinson, Cooper had declared that if the king were brought back not a hair of any man's head, nor a penny of any man's estate, should be touched (Christie, i. 239). He speedily found that to uphold this was impossible, if he were to continue in favour, and he therefore did the next best thing he could. The fact that he was on the special commission for the trial of the regicides has often been quoted against him. Other commissioners were in the same case, and a year before the Restoration Hyde wrote of him in terms that he certainly would not have used had Cooper been in his eyes guilty of complicity in the
