Constitutional History of England, Vol 1 of 3

5-1

to have raised some expectation of him, and to have procured at his accession some of that popularity, which is rarely withheld from untried princes. Yet it does not appear that he enjoyed even this first transient sunshine of his subjects' affection. Solely intent on retrenching the excesses of prerogative, and

ack on the representatives of the people. But Charles succeeded to a war, at least to the preparation of a war, rashly undertaken through his own weak compliance, the arrogance of his favourite, and the generous or fanatical zeal of the last parliament. He would have perceived it to be manifestly impossible, if he had been capable of understanding his own position, to continue this war without the constant assistance of the House of Commons,

o expect subsidies equal to the occasion, until a foundation of confidence should be laid between the Crown and parliament. The Commons had begun probably to repent of their hastiness in the preceding year, and to discover that Buckingham and his pupil, or master (which shall we say?), had conspired to deceive them.[631] They were not to forget that none of the chief grievances of the last reign were yet redressed, and that supplies must be voted slowly and conditionally if they w

on and Middlesex, to dispute the right of the Commons to impeach a minister of state. The king, however, anticipating their resolutions, after some sharp speeches only had been uttered against his favourite, sent a message that he would not allow any of his servants to be questioned among them, much less such as were of eminent place and near unto him. He saw, he said, that some of them aimed at the Duke of Buckingham, whom, in the last parliament of his father, all had combined to honour and respect, nor did he know what had happened since to alter their affections; but he assured them that the duke had done nothing without his own special direction and appointment. This haughty message so provoked the Commons that, having no express testimony against Buckingham, they came to a vote that common fame is a good ground of proceeding either by inquiry, or presenting the complaint to the king or Lords; nor did a speech from the lord keeper, severely rating their presumption, and requiring on the king's behalf that they

d the words imputed to Digges; and, thirty-six peers asserting that he had not spoken them, the king admitted that he was mistaken, and released both their members.[636] He had already broken in upon the privileges of the House of Lords, by committing the Earl of Arundel to the Tower during the session; not upon any political charge, but, as was commonly surmised, on account of a marriage which his son had made with a lady of royal blood. Such private offences were sufficient in those arbitrary reigns to expose the subject to indefinite imprisonment, if not to an actual sentence in the star-c

mply with it by taking his place. But the spirited earl knew that the king's constitutional will expressed in the writ ought to outweigh his private command, and laid the secretary's letter before the House of Lords. The king prevented any further interference in his behalf by causing articles of charge to be exhibited against him by the attorney-general, whereon he was committed to the Tower. These assaults on the pride and consequence of an aristocratic assembly, from whom alone the king could expect effectual support, display his unfitness not only for the government of England, but of any other nation. Nor was his conduct towards Bristol less oppressive than impolitic. If we look at the harsh and indecent employment of his own authority and even testimony, to influence

arch's honour. He had issued letters of privy seal, after the former parliament, to those in every county, whose names had been returned by the lord lieutenant as most capable, mentioning the sum they were required to lend, with a promise of repayment in eighteen months.[641] This specification of a particular sum was reckoned an unusual encroachment, and a manifest breach of the statute against arbitrary benevolences; especially as the name of those who refused compliance were to be returned to the council. But the government now ventured on a still more outrageous stretch of power. They first attempted to persuade the people that, as subsidies had been voted in the House of Commons, they should not refuse to pay them, though no bill had been p

furnish a justification for extorted loans, our free-born high-minded gentry would not long have brooked to give their attendance in such an ignominious assembly, and an English parliament would have become as idle a mockery of national representation as the cortes of Castile. But this kingdom was not in a temper to put up with tyranny. The king's advisers were as little disposed to recede from their attempt. They prepared to enforce it by the arm of power.[644] The common people who refused to contribute were impressed to serve in the navy. The gentry were bound by recognisance to appear at the council-table, where many of them were committed to prison.[645] Among these were five knights, Darnel, Carbet, Earl, Heveningham, and Hampden, who sued the court of king's bench for their writ of habeas corpus. The writ was granted; but the

presentment, or by writ original at the common law." And this is again enacted three years afterwards, with little variation, and once again in the course of the same reign. It was never understood, whatever the loose language of these old statutes might suggest, that no man could be kept in custody upon a criminal charge before indictment, which would have afforded too great security to offenders. But it was the regular practice that every warrant of commitment, and every return by a gaoler to the writ of habeas corpus, must express the nature of the charge, so that it might appear whether it were no legal offence; in which case the party must be instantly set at libert

be bailed by the court. Yet in some of these instances the words "by the king's special command," were inserted in the commitment; so that they served to repel the pretension of an arbitrary right to supersede the law by his personal authority. Ample proof was brought from the old law books that the king's command could not excuse an illegal act. "If the king command me," said one of the judges under Henry VI., "to arrest a man, and I arrest him, he shall have an action of false imprisonment against me, though it were done in the king's presence." "The king," said Chief Justice Markham to Edward IV., "cannot arrest a man upon suspicion of felony or treason, as any of his subjects may; because if he should wrong a man

ll that it should be so." He alludes afterwards, though somewhat obscurely, to the king's absolute power, as contra-distinguished from that according to law; a favourite distinction, as I have already observed, with the supporters of despotism. "Shall we make inquiries," he says, "whether his commands are lawful?-who shall call in question the justice of the king's actions, who is not to give account for them?" He argues from the legal maxim that the king can do no wrong, that a cause must be presumed to exist for the commitment,

; but with so little success that I cannot perceive more than one case mentioned by him, and that above a hundred years old, which supports this doctrine. The best authority on which he had to rely, was the resolution of the judges in the 34th of Elizabeth, published in Anderson's Reports.[646] For, though this is not grammatically worded, it seems impossible to doubt that it acknowledges the special command of the king or the authority of the privy council as a body, to be such sufficient warrant for a commitment as to require no further cause to be expressed, and to prevent the judges from discharging the party from custody, either absolutely or upon bail. Yet it was evidently the consequence of th

y of any one living, had witnessed such violations of public liberty as 1627. Charles seemed born to carry into daily practice those theories of absolute power, which had been promulgated from his father's lips. Even now, while the writs were out for a new parliament, commissioners were appointed to raise money "by impositions or otherwise, as they should find most convenient in a case of such inevitable necessity, wherein form and circumstance must be dispensed with rather than the substance be lost and hazarded;"[649] and the levying of ship-money was already debated in the council. Anticipating, as indeed was natural, that this House of Commons would correspond as ill to the king's wishes as their predecessors, his advisers were preparing schemes more congenial, if they could be rendered effective, to the spirit in which he was to govern. A contract was entered into for transportin

ndation of the Petition of Right, presented by the Commons in the shape of a declaratory statute. Charles had recourse to many subterfuges in hopes to elude the passing of this law; rather perhaps through wounded pride, as we may judge from his subsequent conduct, than such apprehension that it would create a serious impediment to his despotic schemes. He tried to persuade them to acquiesce in his royal promise not to arrest any one without just cause, or in a simple confirmation of the Great Charter, and other statutes in favour of liberty. The peers, too pliant in this instance to his wishes, and half receding from the patriot banner they had lately joined, lent him their aid by proposing amendments (insidious in those who suggested them, though not in the body of the house), which t

uch secrecy, that the king may commit a subject without showing the cause for a convenient time." The king then delivered them a second question, and required them to keep it very secret, as the former: "Whether, in case a habeas corpus be brought, and a warrant from the king without any general or special cause returned, the judges ought to deliver him before they understand the cause from the king?" Their answer was as follows: "Upon a habeas corpus brought for one committed by the king, if the cause be not specially or generally returned, so as the court may take knowledge thereof, the party ought by the general rule of law to be delivered. But, if the case be such that the same requireth secrecy, and may not presently be disclosed, the court of discretion may forbear to deliver the prisoner

nd though, after being beaten from this evasion, he was compelled to accede in general terms to the petition, he had the insincerity to circulate one thousand five hundred copies of it through the country, after the prorogation, with his first answer annexed

t no man hereafter be compelled to make or yield any gift, loan, benevolence, tax, or such like charge without common consent by act of parliament; and that none be called to answer or take such oath, or to give attendance, or be confined or otherwise molested or disquieted concerning the same, or for refusal thereof; and that no freeman in any such manner as is before mentioned be imprisoned or detained; and that your majesty would be pleased to remove

he present king without consent of parliament; the Lords having rejected, as before-mentioned, a bill that limited it to a single year. The house now prepared a bill to grant it, but purposely delayed its passing; in order to remonstrate with the king against his unconstitutional anticipation of their consent. They declared "that there ought not any imposition to be laid upon the goods of merchants, exported or imported, without common consent by act of parliament; that tonnage and poundage, like other subsidies, sprung from the free grant of the people; that when impositions had been laid on the subjects' goods and merchandises without authority of law, which had very seld

ho gallantly refused to comply with the demands of the custom house, had their goods distrained, and on suing writs of replevin, were told by the judges that the king's right, having been established in the case of Bates, could no longer be disputed.[658] Thus the Commons re-assembled, by no means less inflamed against the king's administration than at the commencement of the preceding session. Their proceedings were conducted with more than usual warmth.[659] Buckingham's death, which had occurred since the prorogation, did not allay thei

ices, yet this law being only in affirmation of the queen's inherent supremacy, she might, by virtue of that, regulate all ecclesiastical matters at her pleasure, and erect courts with such powers as she should think fit. Upon this somewhat dangerous principle, Archbishop Bancroft deprived a considerable number of puritan clergymen;[660] while many more, finding that the interference of the Commons in their behalf was not regarded, and that all schemes of evasion were come to an end, were content to submit to the obnoxious discipline. But their affections being very little conciliated by this coercion, there remained a large party within the bosom of the established church, prone to watch for and magnify the errors of their spiritual rulers. These men preserved the name of puritans. Austere in their lives, while

their tenets to those of the abjured religion. They began by preaching the divine right, as it is called, or absolute indispensability, of episcopacy;[661] a doctrine of which the first traces, as I apprehend, are found about the end of Elizabeth's reign. They insisted on the necessity of episcopal succession regularly derived from the apostles. They drew an inference from this tenet, that ordinations by presbyters were in all cases null. And as this affected all the reformed churches in Europe except their own, the Lutherans not having preserved the succession of their bishops, while the Calvinists had altogether abolished that order, they began to speak of them not as brethren of the same faith, united

tem which, once promulgated, soon gained ground as suiting their atrabilious humour, and affording a new theme of censure on the vices of the great.[663] Those who opposed them on the high church side, not only derided the extravagance of the Sabbatarians, as the others were called, but pretended that the commandment having been confined to the Hebrews, the modern observance of the first day of the week as a season of rest and devotion was an ecclesiastical institution, and in no degree more venerable than that of the other festivals or the season of Lent, which the puritans stubbornly despised.[664] Such a controversy might well have been left to the usual weapons. But James I., or some of the bishops to whom he listened, bethought themselves that this might serve as a test of puritan ministers. He published accordingly a declaration to be read in churches, permitting all lawful recreations on Sunday after divin

Sunday," one Mr. Shepherd, sneering at the puritans, remarked that, as Saturday was dies Sabbati, this might be entitled a bill for the observance of Saturday, commonly called Sunday. This witticism brought on his head the wrath of that dangerous assembly. He was reprimanded on his knees, expelled the house, and when he saw what befell poor Floyd, might deem himself

o bias to warp their judgment will not perhaps have much hesitation in drawing their line between, though not at an equal distance between, the conflicting parties. It appears, on the other hand, that the articles are worded on some of these doctrines with considerable ambiguity; whether we attribute this to the intrinsic obscurity of the subject, to the additional difficulties with which it had been entangled by theological systems, to discrepancy of opinion in the compilers, or to their solicitude to prevent disunion by adopting formularies which men of different sentiments might subscribe. It is also manifest that their framers came, as it were, with averted eyes to the Augustinian doctrine of predestination, and wisely reprehended those wh

e find explicit proofs that Jewel, Nowell, Sandys, Cox, professed to concur with the reformers of Zurich and Geneva in every point of doctrine.[668] The works of Calvin and Bullinger became textbooks in the English universities.[669] Those who did not hold the predestinarian theory were branded with reproach by the names of free-willers and Pelagians.[670] And when the opposite tenets came to be advanced, as they were a

were promulgated with much vacillation and indistinctness. When they were published in unequivocal propositions by Arminius and his school, James declared himself with vehemence against this heresy.[673] He not only sent English divines to sit in the synod of Dort, where the Calvinistic system was fully established, but instigated the proceedings against the remonstrants with more of theological pedantry than charity or decorum.[674] Yet this inconsistent monarch within a very few years was so wrought on by one or two favourite ecclesiastics, who inclined towards the doc

ld, independently of all political motives, predominate in any popular assembly. But they had a sort of excuse for it in the close, though accidental and temporary, connection that subsisted between the partisans of these new speculative tenets and those of arbitrary power; the churchmen who receded most from Calvinism being generally the zealots of prerogative.

ave too rigorously interpreted." But the temper of those he addressed was very different. The catholics were disappointed by an act inflicting new penalties on recusants, and especially debarring them from educating their children according to their consciences.[677] The administration took a sudden turn towards severity; the prisons were filled, the penalties exacted, several suffered death,[678] and the general helplessness of their condition impelled a few persons (most of whom had belonged to what was called the Spanish party in the last reign) to the gunpowder conspiracy, unjustly imputed to the majority of catholics, though perhaps extending beyond those who appeared in it.[679] We cannot wonder that a parliament so narrowly rescued from personal destruction endeavoured to draw the cord still tighter round these dangerous enemies. The statute passed on this occasion is by no means more harsh than might be expected. It re

prove its unlawfulness. The king stooped to a literary controversy with this redoubted champion, and was prouder of no exploit of his life than his answer to the cardinal's book; by which he incurred the contempt of foreign courts and of all judicious men.[681] Though neither the murderous conspiracy of 1605, nor this refusal to abjure the principles on which it was founded, could dispose James to persecution, or even render the papist so obnoxious in his eyes as the puritan; yet he was long averse to anything like a general remission of the penal laws. In sixteen instances after this time, the sanguinary enactments of his predecess

ckingham, in his first eagerness for the marriage on arriving in Spain, wrote to ask if the king would acknowledge the pope's spiritual supremacy, as the surest means of success. James professed to be much shocked at this, but offered to recognise his jurisdiction as patriarch of the west, to whom ecclesiastical appeals might ultimately be made; a concession as incompatible with the code of our protestant laws as the former. Yet with this knowledge of his favourite's disposition, he gave the prince and him a written promise to perform whatever they should agree upon with the court of Madrid.[685] On the treaty being almost concluded, the king, prince, and privy council swore to observe certain stipulated articles, by which the infanta was not only to have the exercise of her religion, but the education of her children till t

ply to one received from him, in language evidently intended to give an impression of his favourable dispositions towards the Romish faith. The whole tenor of his subsequent life must have satisfied every reasonable inquirer into our history, of Charles's real attachment to the Anglican church; nor could he have had any other aim than to facilitate his arrangements with the court of Rome by this deception. It would perhaps be uncandid

catholics. But the lord keeper, Bishop Williams, hesitated at so unpopular a stretch of power.[688] And, the rupture with Spain ensuing almost immediately, the king, with a singular defiance of all honest men's opinion, though the secret articles of the late treaty had become generally known, declared in his first speech to parliament

se promises were irregularly fulfilled, according to the terms on which Charles stood with his brother-in-law. Sometimes general orders were issued to suspend all penal laws against papists; again, by a capricious change of policy, all officers and judges are directed to proceed in their execution; and this severity gave place in its turn to a renewed season of indulgence. If these alterations were not very satisfactory to the catholics, the whole scheme of lenity displeased and alarmed the protestants. Tolerance, in any extensive sense, of that proscribed worship was equally abhorrent to the prelatist and the puritan; though one would have winked at its peaceable and domestic exercise, which the other was zealous to eradicate. But, had they been capable of more liberal reasoning upon this subject, there was enough to justify their indignation at this attempt to sweep away the restrictive code established by so many statutes, and so long deemed essential to the security of their church, by an unconstitutional exertion of the prerogative, prompted by no more worthy motive than compliance with a foreign power, and tending to confirm suspicions of the king's wavering between the two religions, or his indifference to either. In the very first months of his reign, and while that parliament was sitting, which has been reproached for its parsimony, he sent a fleet to assist the French king in blocking up the port of Rochelle; and

n a more favourable light. The homily against wilful disobedience and rebellion was written on occasion of the rising of the northern earls in 1569, and is full of temporary and even personal allusions.[694] But the same doctrine is enforced in others of those compositions, which enjoy a kind of half authority in the English church. It is laid down in the canons of convocation in 1606. It is very frequent in the writings of English divines, those especially who were much about the court. And an unlucky preacher at Oxford, named Knight, about 1622, having thrown out some intimation that subjects oppressed by their prince on account of religion might defend themselves by arms; that univer

for preferment which they knew the readiest method to attain, taught that the king might take the subject's money at his pleasure, and that no one might refuse his demand, on penalty of damnation. "Parliaments," said Mainwaring, "were not ordained to contribute any right to the king, but for the more equal imposing and more easy exacting of that which unto kings doth appertain by natural and original law and justice, as their proper inheritance annexed to their imperial Crowns from their birth."[696] These extravagances of rather obscure men would have passed with less notice, if the government had not given them the most indecent encouragement. Abbot, Archbishop of Canterbury, a man of integrity, but upon that account as well as for his

could act, in the main, no otherwise than by endeavouring to keep him in the power of parliament, lest his power should make parliament but a name. Every popular assembly, truly zealous in a great cause, will display more heat and passion than cool-blooded men after the lapse of centuries may wholly approve.[699] But so far were they from encroaching, as our Tory writers pretend, on the just powers of a limited monarch, that they do not appear to have conceived, they at least never hinted at, the securities without which all they had obtained or attempted would become ineffectual. No one member of that house, in the utmost warmth of debate, is recorded to have suggested the abolition of the court of star-chamber, or any provision for the periodical meeting of parliament. Though such remedies for the greatest abuses were in reality consonant to the act

RESS, PRINTE

TNO

Essays and Studie

Constitutional History as a continuation of this chapter, which sketches the development of the constituti

w at the Renai

es (12th ed.)

lished by authority, and is brought forward in the First Report of the Lords' Committee, on the dignity of a Peer (1819), p. 282. Nothing can be more evident than that

s said to conclude to the court; the effect of which is to make it necessary for the plaintiff to reply; in which replication he may deny the facts pleaded in justification, and conclude to the country; or allege some new matter in explanation, to show that they do not meet all the circumstances, concluding to the court. Either party also may demur, that is, deny that, although true and complete as a statement of facts, the declaration or plea is sufficient according to law to found or repel the plaintiff's suit. In the last case it becomes an issue in law, and is determined by the judges without the intervention of a jury

l justification on the pleadings, but to give it in evidence on the general issue; that is, upon a bare plea of denial. In this case the whole matter is actually in the power of the jury. But they are generally bound in conscience to defer, as to the operation of any rule of law, to what is laid down on that head by the judge; and when they disregard his directions, it is usual to annul the verdict, and grant a new trial. There seem to be some disadvantages in the annihilation, as it may be called, of w

nted to about 2,300,000, with one still more loose under Elizabeth in 1588, which would give about 4,400,000; making some allowance

England as "jure h?reditario ad te legitimum in illo pr?decessorum tuorum successorem pertinens." Rymer,

. 11 H.

al obligations. In the latter sense, whoever attends to the preamble of the act will see that Hawkins, whose opinion Blackstone calls in question, is right; and that he i

inuation of which, in the same spirit, and with the same qualities (besides some others that are rather too much wanting in it), would be a valuable accession not only to the lawyer's, but philosopher's librar

ntly acted upon, in this reign, that in 11 H. 7 the judges held that the donor of an estat

old. "Forthwith Mr. Tyler, one of the privy chamber, that was then present, resorted to the king, declaring that a beardless boy, called More, had done more harm than all the rest, for by his means all the purpose is dashed.

s to be a mistake. The preamble of 11 H. 7 recites it to have been "granted by divers of your subjects

Hall,

f persons paid fines for their share in the western rebellion of 1497, from ￡200

H. 8,

c. 3. Rep.

nry VIII.'s accession made restitution to some who had been wronged by the extortion of the late reign;-a singular contrast to their subsequent proceedings! This, indeed, had been enjoined

ter. But it is more probable that this is of his own invention. He has taken a similar liberty on another occasion, throwing his own broad notions of religion into an imaginary speech of some unnamed member of the Comm

t of his chronicle in the late expensive, and therefore incomplete, collection; since he adds no one word, and omits only a few ebullitions of protestant zeal which he seems to have considered too warm. Holingshed, though valuable, is

reserved in a letter from a member of the Commons to the Earl of Surrey (s

tlemen of the one party; which in so long time were spoken with, and made to see, yea, it may fortune, contrary to their heart, will, and conscience. Thus hanging this matter, yesterday the more part being the King's servants, gentlemen, were there assembled; and so they, being the more part, willed and gave to the King two shillings of the pound of goods or lands, the best to be taken for the King. All lands to pay two shillings of the pound for the laity, to the highest. The goods to pay two shillings of the pound, for twenty pound upward; and from forty shillings of goods, to twenty pound, to pay sixteen pence of the pound; and under forty shillings, every person to pay eight pence. This to be paid in two years. I have

slature. But it was granted by his first parliament, stat. 1 H. 8, c. 20, as will be found even in Ruffhead's table of contents, though not in the body of his volume; and

ossible that such sums as shall be so granted by the way of loan, be forthwith levied and paid, or the most part, or at the least the moiety thereof, the same to be paid in as brief time after as they can possibly persuade and induce them unto; showing unto them that, for the sure payment thereof, they shall have writings delivered unto them under the king's privy seal by such person or persons as shall be deputed by the king to receive the said loan, after the form of a minute to be shown unto them by the said commissioners, the tenor whereof is thus: We, Henry VIII., by the grace

the king's reign, must have sat later than Easter 1522. He informs the cardinal, that from twenty pounds upward there were not twenty in the county of Norfolk who had not consented. "So that I see great likelihood that this grant shall be much more than the loan was." It was done, however, very reluctantly, as he confesses; "assuring your grace that they have not granted the same without shedd

nd in summer, that they fear not to speak, that they be continually beguiled, and no promise is kept unto them; and thereupon some of them suppose that if this gift and grant be once levied, albeit the king's grace go not beyond the sea, yet nothing shall be restored again, albeit they be showed the contrary. And generally it is reported unto me, that for the most part every man saith he will be contented if the king's grace have as much as he can spare, but verily many say they be not able to do as they be required. And many denieth not but they will give the king's grace according to their power, but they will not anywise give at other men's appointments, which knoweth not their needs.... I have heard say, moreover, that when the people be commanded to make fires and tokens of joy for the taking of the French king, divers of them have spoken that they have more cause to weep than to rejoice thereat. And divers, as it hath been showed me secretly, have wished openly that the French king were at his liberty ag

ems to have thought it passing strange that people would be so wrongheaded about their money. "I have been," he says, "in this shire twenty years and above, and as yet I have not seen men but would be conformable

w the fallacy of Hume's hasty assertion, that the writers of the sixteenth c

Hall,

allen master that nothing was done upon them. "Upon this honest beginning," says Lord Herbert, "Cromwell obtained his first reputation." I am disposed to conjecture from Cromwell's character and that of the House of Commons,

spake ill of the whole parliament; for almost every man counted it his debt, and reckoned surely of the payment of the same, and therefore some made their wills

onies thus received by way of loan in 1543 amounted to ￡110,147 15s. 8d. There was also a sum called devotion money, amounting o

et gave ￡6807; Kent ￡6471; Suffolk ￡4512; Norfolk ￡4046; Devon ￡4527; Essex ￡5051; but Lancaster only ￡660; and Cumberland, ￡574. The whole produced ￡119,581 7s. 6d. besides arrears. In Haynes's State Papers, p. 54, we find

s, that Reed having been taken by the Scots, was compelled to pa

ese commissions bearing

ads the trial will find any evidence to satisfy a reasonable mind; and Hume himself soon after adds, that his crime proceeded more from indiscre

re to his highness that could be imagined, and much in the same advance your own honour."-P. 32. He must have thought himself in danger from some of these letters, which indicate the king's distrust of him. He had recommended the employment of men of high rank as lords of the marches, instead of the rather inferior persons whom the king had lately chosen. This called down on him rather a warm reprimand (p. 39); for it was the natural policy of a

ers as well as the English nation to restore religion by force, if not to dethrone Henry. It is difficult not to suspect that he was influenced by ambitious views in a proceeding so trea

lisbury and the Marchioness of Exeter were not heard in their defence. The acts of attainder against th

is Essex, et communi omnium procerum tunc pr?sentium concessu nemine discrepante, expedita est." And at the close of the session, we find a still more remarkable testimony to the unanimity of parliament, in the following words: "Hoc animadvertendum est, quod in haac sessione cum proceres darent suffragia, et dicerent sententias super actibus pr?dictis, ea erat concordia et sententiarum conformitas, ut singuli iis et

But Anne had all the failings of a vain, weak woman, raised suddenly to greatness. She behaved with unamiable vindictiveness towards Wolsey, and perhaps (but this worst cha

e and extravagant lies of Sanders about her birth; without vouching for them indeed, but without any reprobation of their absurd malignity. Lingard's Hist. of England, vi. 153 (8vo. edit). Thus he intimates that "the records of her trial and conviction have perished, perhaps by the hands of those who respected her memory" (p. 316); though, had he read Burnet with any care, he would have found that they were seen by that his

as an innocent and injured woman, falling a victim to the intrigues of a religious faction." He well knows that he could not have done so, without contradicting the tenor of his entire work, without ce

much indebted, has, in his history of Henry VIII., gone upon the strange principle of exalting that tyrant's reputation at the expense of every one of his victims, to whatever party they may have belonged. Odit damnatos. Perhaps he is the first, and will

y a man, the beheading was part of the sentence, and the king only remitted the more cruel preliminaries. Women, till 1791, were condemned to be burned. But the two queens of Henry, the Countess of Salisbury, Lady Rochford, Lady Jane Grey, and, in later times, Mrs. Lisle, were beheaded. Poor Mrs. Gaunt was not thought noble enough to

evidence was thought sufficient; and the strongest proofs against Catherine Howard undoubtedly related to

dency of the reigning party."-P. 407. This is a very strange assertion; for he proceeds to admit her ante-nuptial guilt, which indeed she is well known to have confessed, and doe

t. 26 H.

ls by commission under the great seal is as valid as if he were personally present; any custom or use to the contrary notwiths

2 H. 8

8 H. 8

5 H. 8

8 H. 8

and disobedience of the king's proclamations by some "who did not consider what a king by his royal power might do, which if it continued would tend to the disobedience of the laws of God, and the dishonour of the king's majesty, who might full ill bear it," etc. See this act at length in the great edition of the statutes. There was one singular provision; the clause protecting all persons, as mentioned, in their inherita

acter, in that beautiful stanza where he has made the founders of

ajesti

the bond

nry VIII. is less warrantable; and he should have blushed to excuse, by absurd and unwort

re still some, on the other side of the Channel, servile enough to extol; not in t

t shall have the benefit of clergy though he cannot read. Sect. 14. Yet o

rype, 147

re asked whether they would consent to have him as their king. See the form observed at Richard the Second's coronation in Rymer, vii. 158. But at Edward's coronation, the archbishop presented the king to the people, as rightful and undoubted inheritor by t

ise of its prerogatives. But this alteration in the form is a curious proof of the solicitude displayed by the Tudors, as it wa

historians, which I have found attested by foreign writers of that age (though Burnet has thrown doubts upon it), that some differences between the queen-dowager and the Duchess of Somerset aggravated at least those of their husbands. P. 61, 69. It is alleged with absurd exa

d to doubt whether the commons actually heard witnesses aga

nd 6 Edw. VI.,

concerning which some doubt had arisen. 1 Mary, sess. 2, c. 4. It is said in this statute, "her highness'

his death; then to the Lady Jane and her heirs male; then to the heirs male of Lady Katharine; and in every instance, except Jane, excluding the female herself. Strype's Cranmer, Append. 164. A late author, on consulting the original MS., in the king's handwriting, found that it had been at first wr

ber, presented to 256 livings, restoring all those turned out under the acts of uniformity. Yet the deprivation of the bishops might be justified probably by the terms of the commiss

story on the authority of Father Persons, whom his readers probably do not esteem quite as

Carte

Burnet, ii. Append

unds this commission with something different two years earlier) will not hear of thi

rype, i

ies planned in her behalf (which is, however, very probable), was at least too dangerous to be left at liberty. Noailles intrigued with the malcontents, and instigated the rebellion of Wyatt, of which Dr. Lingard gives a very interesting account. Carte, indeed, differs from him in many of these circumstances, though writing from the same source, and particularly denies that Noailles gave any encouragement to Wyatt. It is, however, evident from the tenor of his despatches that he had gone great lengths in fomenting the discontent, and was evidently desirous of the success

a bill which had passed both houses, but apparentl

Burne

rable elections for which the council had written letters to the she

committed some knights to the Tower for their language

r, Sir Ralph Bagnal, refused to concur in the act abolishing the supremacy. The queen, however, in her letter to Cardinal Pole, says of this repeal: "Quod non sine contentione, disputatione acri, et summo labore fidelium factum est." Lingard, Carte, Philips's Life of Pole. Noailles speaks repeatedly of

les, vol.

rype, i

iii. 155; Bur

net, ii.

the assertion of Mary's counsellors, the Pagets and Arundels, the most worthless of mankind. We are, in fact, greatly indebted to Noailles for h

guards, each with an archer, demilance and couteiller, like the gendarmerie of France; but on account,

equisite distinction between the concilium secretum, or privy council of state, and

to good and pregnant evidence, or otherwise misbehave themselves, the judge may bind them to appear before the president and

to question the jury who had acquitted a particular person, in order to discover their motive. Norfolk seems to have objected to this for a good reason, "least the fe

nding judges of this court. 3. The lords of parliament are properly de magno concilio regis; but neither those, not being of the king's privy council, nor any of the rest of the judges or barons of the exchequer are standing judges of the court." But Hudson, in his Treatise of the Court of Star-chamber, written about the end of James's reign, inclines to think that all peers had a right of sitting in the court of star-chamber; there being several instances where some who were not of the council of state were present and gave judgment, as in the case of Mr. Davison, "and how they were compl

the statute, 21 H. 8, c. 16, recites a decree by the king's council in his star-chamber, that no alien artificer shall keep more than tw

pposed to require an act of parliament for its confirmation; so far was the governm

laints of the commons against the proceedings before the council in causes civil or criminal, although they did not always attain their concession, yet brought a disreputation upon the proceedings of the council,

of Sir Thomas Smith in the text, it may perhaps be inferred that the council had intermitted in a considerable degree,

much acuteness, this subject of the antiquity of the star-chamber. I do not coincide in all his positions; but the onl

has already given evidence to the world of his singular competence for such an undertaking, and who unites, with all the lear

e complaint he made to the king of my lord cardinal." Lodge's Illustrations, i. p. 27. See also Hall, p. 585, for

case, that the chancellor, treasurer, and privy-seal were the only judges, and the rest but assistants. Coke, 4 Inst. 62, denies t

y VII. in Bacon's

the statute subsisted in full force till beyond the middle of Henry VIII.'s reign, but not long afterwards went into disuse. 3. The court of star-chamber was the old concilium ordinarium, against whos

rnet, i

ity of Sir Thomas More; but he was surely a prejudiced apologist of the clergy, and this historian is hardly less so. An entry on the journals, 7 H. 8, dr

s was insinuated, declares it to be his own. From Henry's general character and proneness to theological disputation, it may be inferred that he had at least a considerable share in the work, though probably wi

ttenberg, in 1521, could have any motive to wish that Henry should be so scurrilously treated? He then bursts out into the most absurd attack on Wolsey; "illud monstrum et publicum odium Dei et hominum, Cardinalis Eboracensis, pestis illa regni tui." This was a singular style to adopt in writing to a king, whom he affected to propitiate; Wolsey being nearer than any man to Henry's heart. Thence, relapsing into his tone of abasement, he says, "ita ut vehemente

cly in Latin to the marriage, as unlawful, for reasons he should there exhibit; "whereunto Mr. Doctor Barnes shall reply, and declare solemnly, also in Latin, the said marriage to be good and effectual in the law of Christ's

the letters lately printed in State

ier, ii. 58); and the greatest difficulty was found, where corruption perhaps had least influence, in the Sorbonne. Burnet himself proves that so

are three letters of his to them, a tenth part of which, considering the nature of the writer, was enough to ter

r birth on September 14, the former date is decisively confirmed by letters in Harl. MSS. 283, 22, and 787, 1 (both set down incorrectly in the catalogue). If a late historian therefore had contented himself with commenting on these dates and the clandestine nature of the marriage, he would not have gone beyond the limits of that character of an advocate for one party which he has chosen to assume. It may not be unlikely, though by no means evident, that Anne's prudence, though, as Fuller says of her, "she was cunning in her chastity,

e beautiful and affecting story of Catherine's behaviour before the legates at Dunstable is told by Cavendish and Hall, from whom later historians have copied it. Burnet, however, in his third volume, p. 46, disputes its truth, and on what should seem conclusive authority, that of the original register, whence it appears that the queen never came into court but once, June 18, 1529, to read a paper protesting against the jurisdiction, and that the king never entered it. Carte accordingly treated the story as a fabrication. Hume of course did not c

, she did constantly declare this; and the evidence adduced to prove the contrary is very defective, especially as opposed to the assertion of so virtuous a woman. Dr. Lingard says that all the favourable answers which the king obtained from foreign universities went upon the

marks to prove Sir William Compton's will in 1528. These exactions had been m

which Wolsey, though then in disgrace, very willingly subscribed. But in March, 1531, he went down to the House of Commons, attended by several lords, to declare the king's scruples about his marriage, and to lay before them the opinions of universities. In this he perhaps thought himself acting ministerially. But there can be no doubt that he always considered the divorce as a matter wholly of the pope's competence, and which no other party could tak

nclave at Rome against the divorce was on the 23rd; so that the latter could not have been the cause of this final rupture. Clement VII. might have been outwitted in his turn by the king, if, after pronouncing a decree in favour of the divorce, he h

, iii. 44;

ines, together with Bucer, signed a permission to the landgrave of Hesse to take a wife or concubine, on account of the drunkenness and disagreeable person of his landgravine. Bossuet, Hist. des Var. des Egl. Protest. vol. i., where the instrument is published. Clement VII., however, recommended the king to marry immediately, and then prosecute his suit for a divorce, which it would be easier for him to obtain in such circumstances. This was as early as January, 1528 (Burnet, i., App. p. 27). But at a much later period, September 1530, he expressly suggested the expedient of allowing the king to retain two

pe, i. 15

full as much a temporiser as Cranmer. But the history of this period has been written with such undisguised partiality by Burnet and Strype on the one hand, and lately by Dr. Lingard on the other, that it is almost amusing

ir and unfair, I may be allowed to refer to the View of the Middle Ages, ch

Specimens of E

ype, i. A

ession, the great wickedness that prevailed therein. Strype says

pare them. P. 159. This is repeated by Lingard, on the authority of some Cottonian manuscripts. Even Burnet speaks of the violent proceedings of a Doctor

better supported by current opinion, and that general testimony which carries conviction, than the relaxed and vicious state of those foundations for many ages before their fall. Ecclesiastical writers had not then learned, as they have since, the trick of suppressing what might excite odium against their church, but speak out boldly and bitterly. Thus we find in Wilkins, iii. 630, a bull of I

ious houses of monks, canons, and nuns, where the congregation of such religious persons is under the number of twelve persons," bestows praise on many of the greater foundations, and certainly does not intimate that their fate was so near at hand. Nor is a

mall sum to each at his departure, to provide for his immediate wants. The pensions to nuns averaged about ￡4. Lingard, vi. 341. He admits that these were ten times their present value in money; and surely they were not unreasonably small. Compare them with those, generally and justly thought munificent, which this country bestows on her veterans of Chelsea and Greenwich. The monks had no right to expect m

ve them personal seats. There are indeed so many parallel instances among spiritual lords, and the principle is so obvious, that it would not be worth noticing, but for a strange doubt said to be thrown out by some legal authorities

net, i. A

f the rental of the kingdom, if Hume were right in estimating that at three millions. But this is certainly by much too high. The author of Harmer's Observations on Burnet, as I have mentioned above,

p. 34, sixteen mitred abbots had revenues above ￡1000 per annum. St. Peter's, Westminst

riate rectories, etc., within the same, belonging to the crown, and to give the latter in exchange, was made (1 Eliz. c. 19). This bill passed on a division in the Common

the following: "His grace may furnish 200 gentlemen to attend on his person; every one of them to have 100 marks yearly-20,000 marks. His highness may assign to the yearly reparation of highways in sundry parts, or the

urnet,

ted, carries the bequest into effect by doing what it presumes to come next in his wishes, though sometimes very far from them. It might be difficult indeed to prove that a Norman baron, who, not quite easy about his future prospects, took comfort in his last hours from the anticipation of daily masses for his soul, would have been better satisfied that his lands should maintain a grammar-school, than that they should escheat to the crown. But to waive this, and to revert to the principle of public utility, it may possibly be true that, in one instance, such as Whalley, a more beneficial disposition could have been made in favour of a college than by granting away the lands. Bu

eiting ten times the value; but a collection was to be made in every parish. The compulsory contributions, properly speaking, began in 1572 (14 Eliz. c. 5). But by a

are both artfully drawn, probably in the main by Cranmer, but not without the interference of some less favourable to the new doctrine, and und

d expert in printing, and as able to execute the said craft as any stranger," proceeds to forbid the sale of bound books imported from the Continent. A

nctions for the same purpose, directs a large Bible to be set up in every parish church. But, next year, the Duke of Norfolk and Gardiner prevailing over Cranmer, Henry retraced a part of his steps; and the act 34 H. 8, c. 1. forbids the sale of Tindal's "false translation," and the reading of the Bible in churches, or by yeomen, women, and other incapable persons. The popish bishops, well aware how much turned on this general liberty of reading the Scriptures, did all in their power to discredit the new version. Gardiner made a list

ible, as having been revised by him, and in later editions. In all these editions of Henry's reign, though the version is properly Tindal's, there are, as I am informed, considerable variations and amendments. Thus, in

n better to give up the Reformation entirely, than to suffer one reflection on the clergy. These dramatic satires on that orde

is young friend Barnaby Fitzpatrick, published by H. Walpole in 1774, are quite unlike the style of a boy. One could wish this journal not to be genuine; for the manner in which he speaks of both his uncles' executions does not show a good heart. Unfortunately, however, there is a letter extant, of the king to Fitzpatrick, which must be genuine, and is in the same strain. He trea

much differing from that now in use. It was always held out by our church, when the object was conciliation, that t

es were left there was most contest, and most peace where t

njurors, and the whole school of Andrews. But, independently of its wanting the authority of Scripture, which the reformers set up exclusively of all tradition, it contradic

on the importance of confession. This also, as is well known, is one of t

4, corpus ita cum pane, seu in pane esse, ut revera cum pane manducetur

the presence. But Martyr was of another judgment, and affected to speak of the sacrament with all plainness and perspicuity." Strype, ii. 121. The truth is, that there were but two opinions at bottom as to th

hrist's body in the consecrated elements; which was never meant to be asserted in any authorised exposition of faith; though in the seventeenth century it was held by many distinguished churchmen. See the 27th, 28th, and 29th articles of religion. An eminent living writer, who would be as useful as he is agreeable, if he could bring himself to write with less heat and haste, says, that at Elizabeth's accession, among other changes

says, for the most part their wives. P. 262. But I do not clearly understand in what the distinction could have consisted; f

. VI. c. 21; 5 and 6 Ed

emporising conformists.-"Out with them all! I require it in God's beha

f twelve parts of the realm, whatever countenance men make outwardly to please them in whom they see the power resteth." Strype, ii. Appendix, H .H. This seems rather to refer to the upper classes, than to the whole people. But at any rate it was an exaggeration of the fact, t

d 6, c. 1; St

against this act, well knowing how little regard would be paid to its intention. In the latter part of the young king's

enormous wealth of the superior ecclesiastics had been the main cause of those corruptions which it was sought to cast away, and that most of the dignitaries were very averse to the new religion. Even Cranmer had written some years before to Cromwell, deprecating the establishment of any prebends out of the conventual estates, and speaking of the collegiate clergy as an idle, ignorant, and gormandising race, who might, without any harm, be extinguished along with the regulars. Burnet

futed the mass by passages of Scripture, they could not permit their subjects to go thither; since it would afford a bad example,

Edw. 6, c. 1; Stry

ll treatment was subsequent to the protector's overthrow. It is to be observed that, in her father's life, she had acknowledged his supremacy, and the justice of her mother's divorce. 1 Strype, 285; 2 Burnet,

yet came yourselves soon after to believe and profess the same doctrine for which you burned her; and now you will needs burn me for a p

e constitution displayed only when out of the sunshine. For in the next reign he was against despotic counsels, of which an instance has been given in the last chapter. His conduct, indeed, with respect to the Spanish connection, is equivocal. He was much against the marriage at first, and took credit to himself for the securities exacted in the treaty with Philip, and established by statute. Burnet, ii. 267. But afterwards, if we may trust Noailles, he fell in with the Spanish party in the council, and even suggested to parliament that the queen should have the same power a

Day, worthy and moderate men, who had gone a great way with the reformation, but objected to the removal of altars, an innovation by no means necessary, and which should have been deferred till the people had gr

opinions, were not renewed under Elizabeth, and a few other variations were made; but upon the whole there is little difference, and none perhaps in those tenets which have been most the object of discussion. See the original Articles

no importance to enquire, whether the protest were made publicly or privately. Nothing can possibly turn upon this. It was, on either supposition, unknown to the promisee, the pope at Rome. The question is, whether, having obtained the bulls from Rome on an express stipulation that he should take a certain oath, he had a right to offer a

knowledgment of her supposed pre-contract of marriage, having proceeded from motives of humanity, ought not to incur much censure, though the sentence of nullity was a mere moc

Burnet

re, eo quod per publicas quasdam denuntiationes quas proclamationes vocant, sublata esset penitus sua jurisdictio, adeo ut neminem judicio sistere, nullum scelus punire, neminem ad ?dem sacram cogere, neque c?tera id genus munia ad eos pertinentia exequi auderent. H?c querela ab

t deligere prudentes aliquot viros utriusque ordinis, qui habita matura tant? rei inter se deliberatione, referrent toti consilio quid pro ratione temporis et rei necessitate in hac caus

nd intended as a complete code of protestant canon law. This was referred for revisal to a new commission; but the king's death ensued, and the business was never again taken up. Burnet, ii. 197; Collier, 326. The Latin style is highly praised; Cheke and Haddon, the most elegant scholars of that age, having been concerned in it. This however is of small importance. The canons are founded on a principle current among the clergy, that a rigorous discipline, enforced by church censures and the aid of the

shments for this offence were intended to be preserved. Burnet, always favourable to the reformers, asserts that they were laid aside. Collier and Lingard, whose bias is the other way, maintain the contrary. There is, it appears to me, some difficulty in determining this. That all persons denying any one of the articles might be turned over to the secular power is evident. Yet it rather seems by one passage in the title, de judiciis contra h?reses, c. 10, that infamy and civil disability were the only punishments intended to be kept up, except in case of the denial of the christian religion. For if a her

taking it away. Yet it seems monstrous to conceive that the denial of predestination (which by the way is asserted in this collection, tit. de h?resibus, c. 22, with a shade more of Calvinism than in the articles) was to subject any one to be burned alive. And on the other hand, there is this difficulty, that Arianism, Pelagianism, popery, anabaptism, are all put on the same footing; so that

nt of heresy was intended to be fixed by act of parliament; and probably wi

d for something more than incompatibility of temper; namely, capitales inimiciti?, meaning, as I conceive, attempts by one party on the other's life. In this respect, their scheme of a very important branch of social law seems far better than our own. Nothing can be more absurd than our modern privilegia, our acts

net, ii. 154; iii. Append

rnet. The former

, 10, 341. No part of England su

Noailles, v. ii. p

of Suffolk, first cousin of the queen. In the parliament of 1555, a bill sequestering the property of "the Duchess of Suffo

ould lose his title (more probably his hereditary office of chamberlain), which would be conferred on the Earl of Pembroke, v. 319. Michele, the Venetian ambassador, in his Relazione del Stato d'Inghilterra, Lansdowne MSS. 840, does not speak favourably of the general affection towards popery. "The En

rotestant side. Burnet's calculation, however, is made by assuming the ejected ministers of the diocese of Norwich to have been in the ratio of the whole; which, from the eminent protesta

e nation, as that which Henry left established, consisting chiefly of what was called catholic in doctrine, but free from the grosser abuses and from all connection with the see of Rome. Arbitrary an

ly devoted to Spain, it is manifest that Mary's reign was inglorious, her capacity narrow, and her temper sanguinary; that, although conscientious in some respects, she was as capable of dissimulation as her sister, and of breach of faith as her husband; that she obstinately and wilfully sacrificed her subjects' affections and interests to a misplaced and discreditable attachment; and that the words with which Carte has concluded the

4, by Speed at 277, and by Lord Burghley at 290. Strype, iii. 473. These numbers come so near to each other, that they may be presumed also to approach the truth. But Carte, on the authority of one of Noailles's letters, thinks many more were put

d raised upon such grounds, does upon every new provocation or jealousy or returning to it break out in most violent and convulsive symptoms."-P. 338. "Delicta majorum immeritus luis, Romane." But those who would diminish this aversion, and prevent these convulsive symptoms, will do better b

"Ce jour d'huy a esté faite la confirmation de 'alliance entre le pape et ce royaume par un sacrifice publique et solemnel d'un docteur predicant nommé Rogerus, le quel a eté brulé tout vif pour estre Lutherien; mais il est mort persistant en son opinion. A

trype,

even released from prison for the time, though soon afterwards detained again, and kept in custody, as is well known, for the rest of this reign. Her inimitable dissimulation was all required to save her from the penalties of heresy and treason. It appears by the memoir of the Venetian ambassador, in 1557 (Lansdowne MSS. 840), as well as from the letters of Noailles, that Mary was desirous to change the succession, and would have done so, had it not been for Philip's reluctance, and the impracticability of obtaining the consent of parliament. Though of a dissembling character, she could not conceal the hatred she bore to one who brought back the memory of her mother's and her own wrongs; especially when she saw all eyes turned towards the successor, and felt that the curse of her own barrenness was to fall on h

he great seal was taken from Archbishop Heath early in January, and given to Sir Nicholas Bacon. Parker was pitched upon to succeed Pole at Canterbury in the preceding month. From the dates of these and other facts, it may be fairly inferred that Elizabeth's resolution was formed independently of the pope's behaviour towards Sir Edward Karn; though that might probably exasperate her against the adherents of the Roman see, and make their religion appear more inconsistent with

n, written at this time with all his cautious wisdom, in Burnet,

tion, the words used in distributing the elements were so contrived by blending the two forms successively adopted under Edward, as neither to offend the popish or Lutheran, nor the Zuinglian communicant. A rubric directed against the doct

duct. Lingard thinks the number must have been much greater; but the visitors' reports seem the best authority. It is however highly probable that others resigned their preferments afterwards, when the casuistry of their

rince, person, prelate, state, or potentate, hath or ought to have any jurisdiction, power, superiority, pre-eminence, or authority, ecclesiastical or spiritual, within this realm; and therefore I do utterly renounce and forsake all foreign jurisdictions, powers, superiorities, and authorities, and do promise that from henceforth

n, may challenge authority and power of ministry of divine service in the church; wherein her said subjects be much abused by such evil-disposed persons. For certainly her majesty neither doth, nor ever will, challenge any other authority than that was challenged and lately used by the said noble kings of famous memory, King Henry VIII. and King Edward VI., which is, and was of ancient time, due to the imperial crown of this realm; that is, under God to have the sovereignty and rule over all manner of persons born within these her realms, dominions, and countries, of

rmative; and this seems to explain the fact, that several persons of that persuasion, besides peers from whom the oath was not exacted, did actually hold offices under the Stuarts, and even enter into parliament, and that the test act and declaration against transubstantiation were thus rendered necessary to make their exclusion certain. Mr. B. decides against taking the oath, but on grounds by no means sufficient; and oddly overlooks the dec

rom the school of Calvin an apprehension of what is sometimes, though rather improperly, called Erastianism-the merging of all spiritual powers, even those of ordination

1 Eliz

e's Annals,

was only 100 marks for the first offence. These imprisonments were probably in many

Strype

s than the catholic clergy were bound in consistency with their principles to do, though it seemed very atrocious to bigots. Mr. Butler says, that some the

very early in her reign (Strype, i. 7), and led to a penal st

s seems, however, to have been the immediate provocation for the statute 5 Eliz.; and it may be thought to indicate a good deal of discontent in that party upon which the conspirators relied. But as Elizabeth

one of these is a pardon to any cook, brewer, vintner, or other, that would poison her. But this is so unlik

5 Eliz

ech, as well as Mr. Atkinson's, authentic. The following is a specimen of the sort of answer given to these arguments: "They say it touches conscience, and it is a thing wherein a man ought to have a scrupl

e's Life of

ind usage, though he had been active in saving the lives of protestants under Mary, from Bishops Horn and Cox (the latter of whom seems to have been an honest, bu

ssented, all noted catholics, excep

es that there may have been some previous meeting at the Nag's Head, which gave rise to the story. This m

fraterni animi studiis cumulatissimè compensare. See the letter in the additions to the first volume of Strype's Annals, prefixed to the

deed for a time existed, see F. Paul, Concile de Trente (par Courayer), ii. 72, 197, 220, etc.; Schmidt,

ype, 513,

places were generally favourers of popery. P. 269. But,

, intererant eorum concionibus, atque ad easdem etiam audiendas filios et familiam suam compellabant. Videbatur illis ut catholici essent, sufficere una cum h?reticis eorum templa non adire, ferri autem posse si ante vel post illos eadem intrassent. Communicabatur de sacrilega Calvini c?na, vel secreto et clanculum intra privatos parietes. Missam qui audiverant, ac postea Calvinianos se haberi volebant, sic se de pr?cepto satisfecisse existimabant. Deferebantur filii catholicorum ad ba

Church His. v

n also by Nalson, entitled, Foxes and Firebrands. It was surmised that one Henry Nicolas, chief of a set of fanatics, called the Family of Love, of whom we read a great deal in this reign, and who sprouted up again about the time of Cromwell, was secretly employed by the popish party. Strype, ii. 37, 589, 595. But

ntion Sir Thomas More's Utopia, the principle of toleration had been avowed by the Chancellor l'Hospital, and many others in France. I mention him as on the stronger side; for in fact the weaker had always professed the general principle, and could demand toleration from those of different sentiments on no other plea. And as to capital inflictions for heresy, which Mr. S. seems chiefly to have in his mind, there is re

of Commons, begging the queen t

Haynes

ers, i. 122 and 163, dated in October and November 1560, whic

s, estimation, or power. 2. It will be thought that the slanderous speeches of the queen with the earl have been true. 3. He shall study nothing but to enhance his own particular friends to wealth, to offices, to lands, and to offend others. 4. He is infamed by death of his wife. 5. He is far in debt. 6. He is likely to be unkind, and jealous of the queen's majesty. Id. 444. These suggestions, and especially the second, if actually laid before the queen, show the plainness and freedom which th

eed on Mary's marriage with Philip, now seemed highly ridiculous, when exacted from a younger brother without territories or revenues. Jura et leges regni conserventur, neque quicqua

that she should be married in the thirty-first year of her age to a foreigner, and have one son, who would be a great prince, and a daughter, etc., etc. Strype

wo questions: 1. Whether it were lawful to marry a papist. 2. Whether the queen might permit mass to be said. To which answers were given, not agreeing with each other. Strype, ii. 150, and Appendix 31, 33. When the Earl of Wor

e. But in the long and confidential correspondence of Cecil, Walsingham, and Sir Thomas Smith, about the queen's marriage with the Duke of Anjou, in 1571, for which they were evidently most anxious, I do not perceive the slightest intimation that the prospect of her bearing children was at all less favourable than in any other case. The council seem, indeed, in the subsequent treaty with

by act of parliament even against her will, asserts some time after, as inconsistently as improperly, that "very few but malcontents and traitors appeared very solicitous in the business of a successor."-P. 401 (in Kennet's Complete Hist. of England, vol.

ontaining a succinct and authentic summary of events in Elizabeth's rei

for not assenting to have the matter of succession proved in parliament; and

xcluded the presence-chamber for furthering the proposition of the s

Monson moved trouble in the pa

receive her answer concerning their petition for the succession and

he parliament not to t

part of the offer of a subsidy to the Commons, who offered lar

d this poor young woman the next year, who was never permitted to see her husband again. Strype, i. 391. The Earl of Hertford underwent a long imprisonment, and continued in obscurity during Elizabeth's reign; but had some public employments under her successor. He was twice afterwards married, and lived to a very advanced age, not dying till 1621, near sixty years a

Haynes

ty of Henry's will is among the Harleian MSS. n. 537 and 555, and has al

r knowledge of his integrity and attachment to his sovereign, which would steadfastly oppose their wicked design of bringing about Norfolk's marriage with Mary, as well as to their jealousy of his influence. Carte reports, on the authority

Cecil and Bacon favoured. Leicester betrayed his associates to the queen. It had been intended that Norfolk should accuse the two counsellors before the Lords, ea ratione ut è senatu regiaque abreptos ad curi? januas

D'Ew

e Grey was living; perhaps therefore it was in a former parliament, for no a

former being first; but over all was a half scutcheon of pretence with the arms of England, the sinister hal

Francis II. and his queen displayed their pretensions to our crown. Forbes's State Papers, vol. i. passim. The following is an instance.

uis pugnaxque

nter se dim

toque remotos

ri? cogit i

, Francisce, qu

annis non p

arranted in asserting her privity to the conspiracy of Amboise as a proved fact. Throckmorton was a man very likely to exceed his instructions; and there is much reason to believe that he did so. It is remarkable that no modern French writer that I have seen, A

swer to what had been alleged by the English court, that a collateral successor had never been declared in any prince's life-time, that whatever reason there might be for that, "if the succession had remained untouch

he Scottish queen be detained, by one means or other, in England." The whole letter manifests the spirit of Elizabeth's advisers, and does no great credit to Sussex's se

ut it appears by a letter from the queen to Lord Shrewsbury (Lodg

Haynes

rfolk, the Earls of Derby, Northumberland, Westmoreland, Cumberland, Shrewsbury. "She had the better hope of this, for that she thought them to be all of the old religion, which she meant to restore again w

ubmission, to the queen (Id. 153) is expressed in a style which would now be thought most pusillanimous in a man of much lower st

ght have been called, contrary to the statute of Edward VI. But the Burghley Papers, published by Haynes and Murden, contain a mass of documents relative to this conspiracy, which leave no doubt as

vii. 54. It was consequently the great resort of the priests from the Netherlands, and in the feeble state of the protestant church there wanted sufficient ministers to stand up in its defence. Strype, i. 509, et post; ii. 183. Many of

published at Rome in 1588, which illustrates the evidence to the same effect con

pe, i. 546

Camden, 428;

ii. 88; Life

not perhaps a treaty, but a verbal agreement between France and Spain at Bayonne some time before; but its object was apparently confined to the suppression of protestantism in Fran

trype,

event several years later. Annals, ii. 630. It was dissolved by Requesens, while governor of Flanders, but revived at Rheims in 1575, under the protection of the ca

as "a precedent most perilous." But Sir Francis Knollys, Mr. Norton, and others defended it. D'Ewes, 162. It seems to have been amended by the Lords. So little notion ha

e, ii. 133;

trype,

fe of Pa

pe's Annal

fs of the increased discontent among the c

ne mass," he declared in preaching against Mary's private chapel at Holyrood House, "was more fearful unto him than if ten thousand armed enemies were landed in any part of the realm, on purpose to suppress the whole religion." M'Crie's Life of Knox, vol. ii. p. 24. In a conversation with Maitland he asserted most explicitly the duty of putting idolaters to death. Id. p. 120. Nothing can be more sanguinary than the reformer's spirit in this remarkable interview. St. Dominic

'Ewes,

e's Life of

ype, who thinks church and state never in the

d. ii.

pe's Annal

9, and Annals of Reformation, ii. 631, e

ed God with great zeal and comfortable examples; for by her council two notorious papists, young Rockwood, the master of Euston Hall, where her majesty did lie upon Sunday now a fortnight, and one Downes, a gentleman, were both committed, the one to the town prison at Norwich

he durst presume to attempt her royal presence, he, unfit to accompany any Christian person; forthwith said he was fitter for a pair of stocks, commanded him out of the court, and yet to attend her council's pleasure at Norwich he was committed. And to dissyffer [sic] the gentleman to the full, a piece of plate being missed in the court, and searched for in his hay-house, in the hay-rick, such an image of our lady was there found, as for greatness, for gayness, and workmanship,

mmanded to preach; a greater and more universal joy to the countries, and the most of the court, than the disgrace of the papists: and th

r majesty did tell me of sundry lewd papist beasts that ha

om Topcliffe favoured. Instances of the ill-treatment experienced by respectable families (the Fitzherberts and Foljambes), and even aged ladies, without any other provocation than their recusancy, may be found in Lodge, ii. 372, 462; iii. 22. But those farthest removed from puritanism partook sometimes of the same tyrannous spirit. Aylmer, bishop

last reference is to a list of magistrates sent up by the bishops from each diocese, wit

litical conduct of catholics to be entirely swayed by their priests, when even in the sixteenth century the efforts of these able men, united with the head of their church, could produce so little effect. Strype owns that Allen's book gave offence to many catholics, iii. 560; Life of Whitgift, 505. One Wright of Douay answered a case of conscience, whether catholics might take up arms to assist the king of Spain against the queen, in the negative. Id. 251; Annals, 565. This man, though a known loyalist, and actually in the employment of the ministry, was afterwards kept in a disagreeable sort of confinement, in the Dean o

z. c. 1 and

ift, p. 117, and oth

in Butler's Mem. of Catholics, vol. iii. p. 382, an affecting narrative, from Dodd's Church History, of the suffer

d's age is not mentioned by Stowe; nor does Dr. Lingard advert to it. No woman was put to death under the penal code, so far as I r

ype's Par

pe's Annal

i. 1050; from the

ciotto sacerdoti e un secolare, fatti morire in Inghilterra per la confessione e difensione della fede cattolica," by no means asserts that he acknowledged Elizabeth to be queen de jure, but rather that he refused to give an opinion as to her ri

y sure, no scribe for the Inquisition could have surpassed. P. 456. But it is plain, even from this account, that Campian owned Elizabeth as

e League to Henry IV., adds the following remarkable paragraph: "Hinc etiam infert universa theologorum et jurisconsultorum schola, et est certum et de fide, quemcunque principem christianum, si a religione catholica manifestè deflexerit, et alios avocare voluerit, excidere statim omni potestate et dignitate, ex ipsa vi juris tum divini tum humani, hocque ante omnem sententiam supremi pastoris ac judicis contra ipsum prolatam; et subditos quoscunque libero

here can, in truth, be no doubt that the allegiance professed to the queen by the seminary priests and jesuits, and, as far as their influence extended, by all catholics, was with this reservation-till they should be strong e

gard, note U, a specification of the diff

rty than to approve such a violation of it. Beal, clerk of the council, wrote, about 1585, a vehement book against the ecclesiastical system, from which Whitgift picks out various enormous propositions, as he thinks

e of a tract published in 1586: "Advertissement des catholiques, Anglois aux Fran?ois catholiques, du danger où ils sont de perdre leur religion et

by the queen out of prudery, as if the usual term implied the possibility of her having unlawful issue. But the papistical libellers put the most absurd interpretation on the word "natural," as if it was meant to secure the succession for some imaginary bastards by

crifice herself to the queen of Cnidus and Paphos, she was unmercifully severe to those about her, of both sexes, who showed any inclination to that worship, though under the escort of Hymen. Miss Aikin, in her well written and interesting Memoirs of the Court of Elizabeth, has collected several instance

nswered by Cardinal Allen, to whom a reply was made by poor Stubbe, after he had lost his right hand. An Italian translation of the Execution of Justice w

ers Tract

te Trials

mers Tra

l and frequently employed by Burleigh, was taken up and

lics to be false. This man had formerly professed himself a protestant, and returned afterwards to the same religion; so that his veracity may be dubious. So, a little further on, we find in the same collection (p. 250) a letter from one Bennet, a priest, to Lord Arundel, lamenting the false accusations he ha

he annual fines paid by them in 1594, is published in Strype, iv. 197, but is plainly very imperfect. The total was ￡3323 1s. 10d. A few paid as much as ￡140 per annum. The average

iii. 260. He sat afterwards in the parliament of 1584, taking, of course, the oath of supremacy, where he alone opposed the act against catholic priests. Parl. Hist. 822. Whether he were actually guilty of plotting against the queen's life (for this part of his treason he denied at the scaffold) I cannot say; but his speech there made contained some very good advice to her. The ministry garbled this before its publication in Holi

ingdom, and to deliver her out of prison; thirdly, for the great trouble and misery they endure more and more, being kept out of all employments, and dishonoured in their own countries, and treated with great injustice and partiality when they have need to recur to law; and also for the execution of the laws touching the confiscation of their goods in such sort as in so short time would reduce the catholics to extreme poverty." Strype, iii. 415. And in the report of the Earl of Northumberland's t

ad one of their condition through severe imprisonment and other ill-treatment. Strype, iii. 412, and Append. 151. Rishton and Ribad

their enemies believed. However, if any of my readers should incline to suspect that there was more disposition among this part of the community to throw off their allegiance to the queen altogether than I have admit

te Trials

27 Eli

most active conspirators, writes to her, 9th July, 1586: "There be some good members that attend opportunity to do the Queen of England a piece of service, which I trust will quiet many things, if it shall please God to lay his a

it for any scrupulousness with respect to Mary. But, without entirely justifying this letter, it is proper to remark, what the Marian party choose to overlook, that it was written after the sentence, during the queen's odious scenes of grimace, when some might argue, though erroneously, that, a legal trial having passed, the formal method of puttin

by the law of nations, and the civil law of the Romans, has forfeited the privileges of an ambassador, and is liable to punishment: secondly, that if a prince be lawfully deposed from his public authority, and another substituted in his stead, the agent of such a prince cannot challenge the priv

were consulted about the legality

d the person of the queen, there appeared such a sympathy, concourse, and consent of all sorts of persons, without respect of religion, as they all appeared to be ready to fight against all strangers as it were with one heart and one body." Notwithstanding this, I am far from thinking that it would have been safe to place the catholics, generally speaking, in command. Sir William Stanley's recent treachery in giving up Deventer to the Spaniards made it unreasonable for them

Murden, 667; Birch's Memoirs of Elizabeth, Lingard, etc. One hundred

33 Eli

r answered. Ribadeneira also inveighs against it. According to them, its publication was delayed til

he says that not more than thirty priests and five receivers had been executed in t

sh gentleman than his zeal against popery. But I cannot help acknowledging that there is reason to believe the disgusting cruelties of the legal sentence to have been frequently inflicted. In an anonymous memorial among Lord Burleigh's papers, written about 1586, it is recommended that priests persisting in their treasonable opinion should be hanged, "and the manner of drawing a

urnet,

for treason." Churton's Life of Nowell, p. 147. Mr. Southey, whose abandonment of the oppressed side I sincerely regret, holds the same language; and a later writer, Mr. Townsend, in his

penalties as rebellion or conspiracy, would any man, free from prejudice, and not designing to impose upon the uninformed, speak of persons convicted on such a statute as guilty of treason, without expressing in what sense he uses the words

s that Campian and some other priests about the same time were indicted on the statute of Edward III. for compassing the queen's death, or intending to depose her. But the only evidence, so far as we know or have reason to suspect, that could be brought against t

on the jesuits, as the "firebrands of all sedition, seeking by right or wrong simply or absolutely the monarchy of all England, enemies to all secular priests, and the causes of all the discord in the English nati

mer, xv.

s Engl. Catho

ented Cecil from promulgating a more atrocious edict than any other, which was published after his death in 1591. De Schismate Anglic. c. 9. This

Birch,

de la Réformation (

ype's Cra

he well-known collection entitled The Ph?nix. It is fairly and temperately written, though with an avowed bias towards the puritan party. Whatever we rea

the German princes, whose bigotry would admit none but members of the Augsburg confession. Jewel's letters to Peter Martyr, in the appendix to Burnet's third volume, throw considerable light on the first two years of Elizabeth's reign; and show that famous prelate to have been what afterwards would have been called a precisi

ingdom, of which Collier makes loud complaint. This, Strype says, gave much offence

Appendix, 290; St

ndys writes, that he had nearly been deprived for expressing himself warmly against images. Id. 296. Other proofs of the text may be found in the same collection, as well as in Strype's Annals, and his Life of Pa

; he was far from sharing the usual opinions on this subject. A puritan pamphleteer took the liberty

urnet,

arriages of bishops should be approved by the metropolitan, and also by commissioners appointed by the queen. Somers Tracts, i. 65; Burnet, ii. 398. It is reasonable to suppose, that when a host of low-bred and illiterate priests were at once released from the obligation to celibacy, many of them would abuse their liberty improvidently, or even scandalously; and this probably had increased Elizabeth's prejudice against clerical matrimony. But I do not suppose that this injunction was ever much regarded. Some time afterwards (Aug. 1561) she put forth another extraordinar

hop at Lambeth, took leave of Mrs. Parker with the following courtesy: "Madam (the style of a married lady) I may not call you; mistress (the appellation at that time of an unmarried woman) I am loth to call you; but, however, I thank you for your good cheer." The lady is styled, in deeds made while her husband was archbishop, Parker, alias Harleston; which was her maiden name. A

ome years after Elizabeth's accession, to pay the bishop

urnet,

cruples were imbibed during the banishment of our reformers, must be received with great allowance. The dislike to some parts of the Anglican ritual had begun at home; it had broken out at Frankfort; it is displayed in all the early documents

nary's discretion, to take away organs, and one or two more of the ceremonies then chiefly in dispute. Burnet, iii. 303 and Append. 319; Strype,

rnet, iii. Append. 289. The common people in London and elsewhere, Strype says, took an active part in demolishing images; the pleasure of destruction, I suppose, mingling with their abhorrence of idolatry. And during the conferences held in Westminster Abbey, Jan. 1559, between the catholic and protestant divines

ch Mr. B. alleges the court to have employed in elections for Elizabeth's first parliament, the argument would equally prove that the majority was protestant under Mary, since she had recourse to the same means. The whole tenor of historical documents in Elizabeth's reign proves that the catholics soon became a minority, and still more among the common people than the gentry. The north of England, where their strength lay, was in every respect the least important part of the kingdom. Even according to Dr. Lingard, who thinks fit to claim half the nation as catholic in the mid

e he supposes the grand apostasy to have been consummated. Cardinal Bentivoglio gives a very different account; reckoning the real catholics, such as did not make profession of heresy, at only a thirtieth part of the whole; though he suppose

ni, atrox animus Catonis, rising above all misfortune, and unconquerable, except by the darkest treachery, is sufficiently admirable without reducing his party to so miserable a fraction. The Calvinists at this time are reckoned by some at one-fourth,

vol. viii. 47, is a letter from Parker, Apr. 1565, complaining of Turner,

pe's Parke

g a disgust to protestantism is intimated in

This, however, is not consistent with other passages, where he appears to importune the queen to proceed. Her wavering conduct, partly owing to caprice, partly to insincerity, was naturally vexatious to a man of his firm and ardent temper. Possibly he might dissemble a lit

ter, these advertisements obtained the queen's sanctio

er, 184. Sampson had refused a bishopric on a

223) that the suspended ministers preache

come strict in enforcing the u

the cross in baptism, the use of organs, baptism by women, etc. P. 314. This last usage was much inveighed against by the Calvinists, because it involved a theological tenet differing from their own, as to the necessi

nglish church (Annals, i. 452; Collier, 503); but dissuaded the puritans fro

of Parker, 242; Li

316; Strype's Par

ee friends, Strype says, in the council abou

roceeds, "if Queen Elizabeth had not lived so long as she did, till all that generation was dead, and a new set of men better educated and principled were grown up and put in their rooms; and if a prince of another religion had succeeded before that time, they had probably turned about again to the old supersti

nts than the foregoing note would lead us to suppose. I believe that many went off to foreign parts from time to time, who had complied

h, in 1562, that in his diocese more than one-third of the benefices were vacant. Anna

ntelligit, Latinè utcunque intelligit; Latinè pauca intelligit," etc. Sometimes, however, we find doctus. L. of Parker, 95. But if the clergy could not read the language in which their very prayers were composed, what other learning or knowledge could they have? Certainly no

.d. 1563, with their qualifications annexed. Three only are described as docti Latinè et Gr?cè; twelve are called docti simply; nine, Latinè docti; thirty-one, Latinè mediocriter intelligen

th, all strongly catholic. These had previously been transmitted to the two universities, and returned with the hands of the greater part

ere popery greatly prevailed, and the gentry were bred up in that religion." Strype's Annals, ii. 539. But afterwards, Wood complains, "through the influence of Humphrey and Reynolds (the latter of whom became divinity lecturer on Secretary Walsingham's foundation in 1586), the disposition of the times, and the long continuance of the Earl of Leicester, the principal patron of the puritanical faction, in the place of Chan

ca carius, religione optatius, vera gloria dulcius; cum in hac familia h? laudes floruerint, vehementer confidimus, etc., qu? ejusdem stirpis sis, easdem cupidissime prosecuturam." It was a singular strain of complaisance to praise Henry's, Edward's, and Mary's religious sentiments in the same breath; but the queen might at least learn this fro

not only the more intemperate party, but many heads of colleges and grave men, among whom we are rather surprised to find the name of Whitgift, interceding with their chancellor for some mitigation as to these unpalatable observances. Strype's Annals, i. 441; Life of Parker, 194. Cambridge had, however, her catholics, as Oxford had her puritans, of

583; Life of Parker, 312,

ition, quoted in Neal's

ort of the overthrow of the established church. P. 111, etc. "As to you, dear brethren," is said in a puritan tract of 1570, "whom God hath called into the brunt of the battle, the Lord keep you constant, that

uring historian holds out the hand of fellowship to the puritans he abhors, when they preach up ecclesiastical independence. Collier liked the royal supremacy as little as Cartwright; and in giving an account of Bancroft's attack on the nonconformists for denying it, enters upon a long discu

e former, he says, contend and lay it down in their supplication to parliament in 1585, that things once dedicated to a sacred use ought so to remain for ever, and not to be converted to any private use. The lay, on the contrary, think it enough for the clergy to

to conform, speaks, in a remarkable letter quoted by Fuller in his Church History, p. 107, of factiosa illa Puritanorum capita, saying that he is totus ab iis alienus, and unwilling perbacchari in episcopos. The same is true of Bernard Gilpin, who disliked some of the ceremonies,

about the next Succession to the Crown of England, p. 242. And again: "The puritan party at home, in England, is thought to be most rigorous of any other, that is to say, most ardent, quick, bold, resolute, and to have a great part of the best captains and soldiers on their side, which is a point of no small moment."-P. 244. I do not quote these passages out of trust in Father Persons, but because they coincide with much besides that has occurred to me in reading, and especially with the parliamentary proceedings of this reign. The following observation will confirm what may startle some readers; that the puritans, or at least those who rather favoure

er them. It would be difficult to prove that, with a view to the interests of religion among the people, or of the clergy themselves, taken as a body, any pluralities of benefices w

156; Parliament.

Parl. Hist. 790; Stryp

latter replied he would do the same, and confine himself to two others; Proba. Lenfant makes a very just observation on this: "Si la gravité de l'histoire le permettoit, on diroit avec le comique: C

trype, ii. 186. Unless these were papists, which indeed is possible, their objection must

e the star-chamber. "He knew them," he said, "to be cowards"-a very great mistake-"and if they of the privy council gave over, they would hinder her majesty's govern

Neal

pe's Annal

ls, ii. 219, 232; L

e prelates were wont to use in this reign, and perhaps contributed to the severity she showed towards him. Grindal was a very honest, conscientious man, but too little of

f every side in the sixteenth century display a want of decency and humanity which even our anonymous libellers have hardly matched. Whitgift was not of much learning, if it be true, as the e

ype's Whi

s Memoirs of Elizabeth,

ed in only six counties, 64 of whom in Norfolk, 60 in Suffolk, 38 in Essex. P. 268. The puritans formed so much the more learned and diligent part of the clergy, that a great scarcity of preachers was experienced throughout this reign, in consequence of silencing so many of the former. Thu

inity in English; that all books were, comparatively to the value of money, far dearer than at present; that the majority of the clergy were nearly illiterate, and many of them addicted to drunkenness and low

t, 137 et alibi pluri

4; Strype's An

come thither, either by means of presentments by witness, or any other politic way they could devise; with full power to proceed as their discretions and consciences should direct them; and to use all such means as the

d a much smaller penalty. But it was held by the judges in the case of Cawdrey (5 Coke Reports), that the act did not take away the ecclesiastical jurisdiction and supr

Whitgift, 135;

Id. 15

scheme on foot, about 1590, to make all persons in office subscribe a declar

eal, 32

. His biographer is here, as in all his writings,

Neal

iterally proposed to sell his bishopric to Bancroft. Id. 169. The other, however, waited for his death, and had above ￡4000 awarded to him; but the crafty old man havin

ers' Trac

on's Work

h's Memoir

ut most of the letters they contain are from the two Bacons, the

o prison the authors and printers. Strype's Whitgift, 288. These pamphlets are scarce; but a few extracts from them may be found in Strype, and other authors. The abusive language of the puri

23 Eli

Whitgift, 409, and Appendix 176. It is a striking contrast to the coarse abuse for which he suffered. Th

ivines who suffered death for the libels above mentioned, was the Rev. Mr. Udal." This is no doubt a splenetic mode of speaking. But Warburton, in his short notes on Neal's history, treats it as a wilful and audacious attempt to impose on the reader; as if the ensuing pages did not let him into all the circumstances. I will here observe that Warburton, in

ication of the Church of England, published anonymously in 1733. Neal replied with tolerable success; but Madox's book is still an useful corrective. Both, however, were, like most controversialists, prejudiced men, loving the interest

e of Whit

360, 366, App

pend. 135; A

among the reformers; Collier quotes passages from Martin Bucer

ginal works in which these tenets are said to be promulgated, I cannot vouch for the fairness of

of the Ch. of Eng. against Neal,

s imputed to them as a crime by their more courtly adversaries, who reproached them

Bancroft, on the ground of its incompatibility with the prerogative, and urged Lord Burleigh to make the bishops acknowledge they had no superiority over the clergy, except by statute, as the only means to save her majesty from the extreme danger into which she was brought by the machinations of the pope and King of Spain. Life of Whitgift, p. 350,

; Strype's Whitgi

ost; Strype's Whitgift

pe's Annal

ls, iii. 186, 192.

Whitgift, 279;

arl. Hi

to Cecil, "whose learning is no learning anywhere but here at home, being born to nothing, doth by his labour and travel in that barbarous knowledge p

the spiritual courts were considered; but nothing was done in it. Strype's Grindal, p. 259, and Appendix, p. 97. And in 1594, a commission to enquir

z. c. 1; Par

, provided he was only the head of the presbyters, and acted in conjunction with them. P. 398. But this was in effect to demand everythin

ship, and of calling in the sword of the magistrates for the support and defence of the several principles, which they made an ill use of in their turns, as they could grasp the power into their hands. The standard of uniformity, according to the bishops, was the queen's supremacy and the laws of the land; a

eal, 25

lesiastical supremacy; the proof of which was their dispersion of Brown's tracts, wherein that was only owned in civil cases. Strype's Annals, iii. 186. This was according to the invariable practice

from thence, and from thence alone. And that which resteth upon any other foundation ought to be esteemed unlawful and counterfeit." Whitgift, in his answer to Cartwright's Admonition, rested the controversy in th

iligence, and assisted with the grace of Almighty God, may grow unto so much perfection of knowledge, that men shall have just cause, when anything pertinent unto faith and religion is doubted of, the more willingly to incline their minds towards that which the sentence of so grave, wise, and learned in that faculty shall judge most sound? For the c

to which James II. ascribed his return into the fold of Rome; and it is not difficult

er I see no evidence or likelihood. If it be true, as is alleged, that different manuscripts of the three last books did not agree, if even these disagreements were the result of fraud, why should we conclude that they were corrupted by the puritans rather than the church? In Zouch's edition of Walton's Life of Hooker, the reader will find a long and ill digested note on this

een printed; a sentence having slipped into the text of the seventh book, which makes nonsense, and which he very probably conjectures

er, in a letter to Cecil, defends it on the best ground; that the bishops hold their lands by barony, and therefore the giving them the title of lords was no irregularity, and

pe's Annal

mmentaries, vol. ii. c. 28. The exception in favour

uched in the fo

ade you what you are: if you do not immediately c

zab

Append. 84. The names of Hatton Garden and Ely Place (Mantua v? miser? nimium vicina

t in the first year of James, c. 3, conveyances of bishops' lands

assim. Observe the preamble of 13 Eliz. c. 10. It must be admitted, on the other hand, that the gentry, when popishly or puritanically affected, were apt to behave exceedingly ill towards the

Strype's Whitgift, 458. And Aylmer, having preached too vehemently against female vanity in dress, which came home to the queen's conscience, she told her ladies that if the bishop held more discourse on such matters, she would fit him for heaven; but he should walk thither without a staff and leave his mantle behind him. Harring

D'Ewes

the ceremony of kneeling at the communion, the cross in baptism, and the surplice; but that they answered, "ne ungulam quidem esse

are possessed of the government of the church towards the other, may hardly be dissembled or excused."-P. 382. Yet Bacon was never charged with affection fo

ans of instruction and persuasion;" the other, that "cases of conscience, when they exceed their bounds, and grow to be matter of faction, lose their nature; and that sovereign princes ought distinctly to punish their practices and contempt, though coloured wi

dging it: secondly, that, according to the principles of Christianity as admitted on each side, it does not rest in an esoteric persuasion, but requires an exterior profession, evidenced both by social worship, and by certain positive rites; and that the marks of this profession, according to the form best adapted to t

e points of view, had a tendency to gravitate; namely, that civil and religious allegiance are so necessarily connected, that it is the subject's duty to follow the dictates of the magistrate in both alike. And this received some countenance from the false an

te Trials

Id.

Id.

x wrote indeed to the queen in favour of the marriage (Lodge, ii. 177); and Cecil undoubtedly professed to favour it; but this must have been out of obsequiousness to the queen. It was a habit of this minister to set down briefly the arguments on both sides of a question, sometimes in parallel columns, sometimes successively; a method which would seem too formal in our age, but tending to give himself and others a clearer view of the case. He has done this twice in the present instance (Murden, 322, 331); and it is evident that he does not, and cannot, answer his

always signed himself Sc?va, in

e, ii. 412

be sufficient. See particularly vol. 703. A letter, inter alia, in this (folio 1) from Lord Hunsdon and Walsingham to the sheriff of Sussex, directs him not to assist the creditors of John Ashburnham in molesting him, "till such

found also in the Biographia Britannica, and

anscript from Anderson's Reports, and consequently of no value. Th

throughout the kingdom. The real motive appears in several letters of the Lansdowne collection. By the domestic culture of woad, the customs on its importation were reduced; and

Camden

ymer, x

e scattered through Rymer; and the w

e made subject to a specific penalty of ￡20; which was levied upon

ave, in preface to "Hale de Jure

Thesaurus, or Latin dictionary for twelve years (Rymer, xv. 620); and to Richard Wright to print his translation of T

ions, in 1559, no one might print any book or paper whatsoever

y such libels against the order and government of the church of England, or the rites and ceremonies used in it, to bring and deliver up the same with co

, and Append. 43, where a l

, he permitted nothing to appear that interfered in the least with his own notions. Thus we find him seizing an edition of some works of Hugh Broughton, an eminent Hebrew scholar. This learned divine differed from Whitgift about Christ's de

yatt's business, a case not all parallel; though there was no sufficient necessity even in that insta

is full as strange, that the bishops were about to pass sentence on him for heresy, in having asserted that a papist might lawfully be

, iii. 570; Life of W

ymer, x

te, 693,

pe's Annal

lways bound to furnish horses and armour, or their value, for the defence of the kingdom in peril of invasion or rebellion. An instance

e (14th Eliz. c. 5), was conceived by the inhabitants to be against law. We have, in Strype's Annals, vol. iii. Append. 56, a letter from the privy council, directing the charge to be taken off. It is only worth noticing, as it il

sums of money unto Torpley (Tarporly) on Friday next the 23rd December, or else that you and every of you give me meeting there, the said day and place, to enter severally into bond to her highness for your appearance forthwith before their lordships, to show cause wherefore you and every of you should refuse to pay her majesty loan according to her h

less need and danger, and yet always fully repaid." Strype, iii. 535. Large sums of money are said to have been demanded of the citizens of London in 1599. Carte, 675. It is perhaps to this year that we may refer a curious fact mentioned in Mr. Justice Hutton's judgment in the case of ship-money. "In the time of Queen Elizabeth (he says), who was a gracious and a glorious queen, yet in the end of her reign, whether through covetousness, or by reason of the wars that came upon her, I know not by what counsel she desired benevolence, the statue of 2nd Richard III. was pressed, y

ike other facts, in his very able, but partial,

cil, that he fears his young landlord, Spelman, has intentions of turning him out of his house, which will be disagreeable; hopes therefore Sir William C. will speak in his behalf."-Feb. 4, 1566, id. 74. "Lord Stafford to Lord Burleigh, to further a match between a certain rich citizen's daughter and his son; he requests Lord B.

hia Britannic

rately published; but I do not find that

om which latter passage it seems that C

d of this session, is but an imperfect copy or abridgment of one which she made in 1566; as D'Ewes himself

amden,

ed to marry in order to divert them from their request th

'Ewes,

ournals, 8th Oct.,

'Ewes,

e is no mention of Stricklan

of 1566, as may be inferred from the lord keeper's reproof to the s

158; Journ

rnals, 9

D'Ewes

D'Ewes

s an understanding between this servant of the house and the government. Proofs and presumptions of this are not unfrequent. In Strype's Annals, vo

D'Ewes

Id., 2

D'Ewes

D'Ewes

] Id

D'Ewes

this gentleman Davenport, whi

D'Ewes

d. 440

] Id

es, 474; T

] Id

iii. 34. Townsend says he was committed to Sir John

D'Ewes

Memoirs of Eli

sidy then proposed. Annals, vol. iii. Append. 238. Not a word about this occurs in D'Ewes's Journal; and I mention it

D'Ewes

ke all of them; as appears by Rymer, xvi. 540, and Carte, iii. 712. A list of the

wes, 619,

te: "God hath given that power to absolute princes, which he attributes to himself-Dixi quod dii estis;" it would have been seen, if Hume had quoted the following sentence, that he infers from hence, that justice being a divine attribute, the king can do nothing that is unjust, and consequently cannot grant licences to the injury of his subjects. Strong language was no doubt used in respect of the prerogative. But it is erroneous to assert, with Hume, that it came equally from the courtiers and country gentlemen, and was admitted by both. It will chiefly be found in the speeches of Secretary Cecil, the official defender of prerogative, and of some lawyers. Hume, after quoting an extravagant speech ascribed to Sergeant Heyle, that "all we have is her majesty's, and she may lawfully at any time take it from us; yea, she hath as m

England. There cannot be a more complete mistake. No such assertion was made; but a member suggested that the speaker might, as the consuls in the Roman senate used, appoint the order in which bills should be read; at which sp

from nine places which had not been presented in the last parliament. But in the end it was "ordered, by Mr. Attorney's assent, that the burgesses shal

r privilege, renewed it both in Elizabeth's reign and that of James. P. 80. This could only have been, it is hardly necessary to say, by obtaining writs out of chancery for that purpose. As to the payment of wages, the words of D'Ewes intimate that it was not entirely disused. In the session of 1586, the borough of Grantham complained that Arthur Hall (whose name now appears for the last time) had sued them for wages due to him

hus we read that a Mr. Copley used to nominate burgesses for Gatton, "for that there were no burgesses in the borough." The present proprietor being a minor in custody of the court of wards, Lord Burleigh directs the Sheriff of S

be a burgess of Oxford; and that he should "order himself in the said room according to such instructions as the said Duke of Norfolk should give him from the king:" if he is not elected at Oxford, the writer will recommend him to some of "my lord's towns of his bishopric of Winchester." Cotton MSS. Cleopatra E. iv. 178. Thus we see that the practice of our government has always been alike; and we may add the same of the nobility, who interfered with election

rough, and three for each county; and by the authority of the sheriffs, the members were chosen from among the candidates." Butler's Book of the Roman Catholic Church, p. 225. I never met with any tolerab

D'Ewes

ournals

at the Commons claim the privilege as belonging to themselves, without the least reference to this circumstance. If they did not always assert it afterwards, this negative presumption is very weak, when we consider how common it was to overlook or recede from precedents, before the constitution had been reduced into a system. Carte, vol. iii. p. 164, endeavours to discredit

als, Feb. 2

sell, 73,

] Id

] Id

] Id

] Id

s, 5th and 7t

had a patron in Lord Burleigh, to whom he wrote many letters, complaining of the Commons, which are extant in the Lansdowne collection. He seems to have been a man of eccentric and unpopular character, and had already incurred the displeasure of the Commons in the session of 1572, when he was ordered to be warned by the serjeant to appear

Hatsel

D'Ewes

only one before the long parliament, wherein the Commons have punished the authors of libels derogatory to their privileges.

nals, 1 Ma

'Ewes,

] Id

] Id

] Id

ed that the speaker should attend the lord keeper about some matter, Sir Edward Hobby took up the word in strong language, as derogatory to their dignity; and

120, 152, etc., ii. 129; Bacon

than the surviving witnesses of his unconstrained will." The object, however, of the book, is to persuade the king to call a parliament (about 1613), and we are not to suppose that Raleigh meant what he said. He was never very scrupulous about truth. In another of his tracts, entitled The Prince; or, Thesaurus of State, he holds, though not without flattery towards James, a more reason

from Fredegarius, Aimoin, and other ancient writers, to prove the elective character and general freedom of the monarchy under the two first races. This made a considerable impression at the time, though the passages in question have been so often

'Ewes,

an. Archbishop Parker, writing to Cecil to justify himself for not allowing the queen's right to grant some dispensation in a case of marriage, says, "he would not dispute of the queen's absolute power, or prerogative royal, how far her highness might go in following the Roman authority; but he yet doubted, that if any

nd these our letters shall be your warrant."-21st April 1587. This letter was delivered to the justices in the presence of the chancellor and Lord Leicester, who were commissioned to hear their answer, telling them also, that the queen had granted the patent on account of her great desire to provide for Cavendish. The judges took a little time to consult what should be said; and, returning to the Lords, answered that they desired in all respects humbly to obey her majesty; but, as this case is, could not do so without perjury, which they well knew the queen would not require, and so went away. Their answer was reported to the queen, who ordered the chancellor, chief justice of the king's bench, and master of the rolls, to hear the judges' reasons; and the queen's council were ordered to attend, when the queen's serjeant began to show the queen's prerogative to grant the issuing of writs, and showed precedents. The judges protested in answer, that they had every wish to assist her majesty to all her rights, but said that this manner of proceeding was out of course of justice; and gave their reasons, that the right of issuing these writs and fees incident to it was in the prothonotaries and others, who claimed it by freehold; who ought to be made to answer, and not

g farther was heard of the business.-Such was the law and the government, which Mr. Hume has compared to that of Turkey! It is almost certain, that neither James

f this passage is quoted by Dr. M'Crie, in his Life of Knox

alth of Englan

he pleases, but that il ne laisse pas d'en ordonner à son plaisir, et centre la volonté des estats, comme on a vu Henry VIII. avoir tou

sent chapter was written, by Mr. Brodie, in his History of the British Empire from the Accession of Charles I. to the Restoration, vol. i. c. 3. In some respects

he right heir, especially for want of true religion. "I affirm and hold," he says, "that for any man to give his help, consent, or assistance towards the making of a king whom he judgeth or believeth to be faulty in religion, and consequently would advance either no religion, or the wrong, if he were in authority, is a most grievous and damnable sin to him that doth it, of what side soever the truth be, or how good or bad soever the party be that is preferred."-P. 216. He pretends to have found very few who favour the King of Scots' title; an assertion by which we may appreciate his veracity. The protestant party, he tells us, was wont to favour the house of Hertford, but of late have gone more

Indies, with many other flattering inducements. Birch's Memoirs, ii. 308. But most of the catholic gentry, it is just to observe, would never concur in the invasion of the kingdom by foreigners, preferring the elevation of Arabella, according to the pope's project. This difference of opinion gave rise, among other caus

History, the Biographia Britannica, or Miss Aikin's James I., i. 360. Mr. Butler is too favourably inc

rprise, England being the greatest naval power in the world, and the people warlike. The pope only replied, that the kingdom had been once conquered, and might be so again; and especially being governed by an old woman, whom he was ignorant enough to compare with Joanna II. of Naples. Vol. i. 399. Henry IV. would not even encourage the project of setting up Arabella, which he declared to be both unju

irmed by Carey, who was there at the time. "She was speechless when the council proposed the King of Scots to succeed her, but put her hand to her head as if in to

he was not behind her in some of the last years of her reign. It appears by a letter from the Earl of Mar, in Dalrymple's Secret Correspondence, p. 2, that James had hopes of a rebellion in England in 1601, which he would have had no scruple in abetting. And a letter from him to Tyrone, in the Lansdowne MSS. lxxxiv. 36, dated 22nd Dec. 1597, when the latter was at least preparing for rebellion, though rather cautious, is full of express

own hand, that thereby it may most clearly and evidently appear by some differences, how the same was not signed with the king's hand, but stamped as aforesaid. And albeit it is used both as an argument and calumniation against my sovereign by some, that the said original hath been embezzled in Queen Mary's time, I trust God will and hath reserved the same to be an instrument to relieve [prove] the truth, and to confound false surmises, that thereby the right may take place, notwithstanding the many exemplifications and transcripts, which being sealed with the great seal, do run abroad in England." Lesley, Bishop of Ross, repeats the same story with some additions. Bedford's Hereditary Right, p. 197. A treatise of Hales, for which he suffered imprisonment, in defence of the Suffolk title unde

e genuineness of Henry's signature. But as it is attested by many witnesses,

bin's) Hereditary Ri

matrimony could not be admitted, and that they had incurred an ecclesiastical censure for fornication. But another, which I have also found in the Museum, Harl. MSS. 6286, contains the whole proceedings and evidence, from which I have drawn the conclus

n the minister who married them being present, and other circumstances agreeing, the jury (whereof John Digby of Coleshill, in com. War. esquire, was the foreman) found it a good marriag

and the papers confused with others relative to Lord Essex's divorce. See as to the same suit, or rat

a week's respite for the delivery of their verdict." Letter of Sir E. Hoby to Sir T. Edmonds, Feb. 10, 1606. "For my lord of Hertford's cause, when the verdict was ready to be given up, Mr. Attorney interposed himself for the king, and said that the land that th

nt of legal title to the house of Stuart which I have endeavoured to support. In the entertaining letters of Joseph Mede on the news of the day (Harl. MSS. 389), it is said that the king had thoughts

ders, ub

ve not adverted to one objection which some urged at the time, as we find by Persons's treatises, Leicester's Commonwealth, and the Conference, to the legitimacy of the Seymours. Catherine Grey had been betrothed, or perhaps married, to Lord Herbert, son of the Earl of Pembroke, during the brilliant days of her family, at the close of Edward's reign. But on her father's fall Pembroke caused a sentence of divorce to be pronounced, the grounds of whic

of hereditary right, and of all those exalted notions concerning the power of preroga

at. 1 Ja

spassionate manner. The author ascribes the loss of Elizabeth's popularity to the impoverishment of the realm, and to the abuses which prevailed. Carte says, "foreigners were shocked on James's arrival at the applause of the populace who had professed to adore the late queen, but in fact she

torian last quoted thinks fit to say in vindication, that "all felonies committed within the verge of the court are cognizable in the court of the king's household," referring to 33 H. 8, c. i. This act, however, contains no such thing; nor does any court appear to have been held. Though the man's notorious guilt migh

indiscreetly censuring his own wife; that he offended the military men by telling them they might sheathe their swords, since peace was his object; that he showed impatience of the common people

d that it would be taken ill; "dans une cour où il sembloit qu'on e?t si fort affecté de mettre en oubli cette grande reine qu'on n'y faisoit jamais mention d'elle, et qu'on évit

esiastical, they humbly desired the redress of some abuses. Their objections were chiefly to the cap and surplice, the cross in baptism, baptism by women, confirmation, the ring in marriage, the reading of the

gdom he had declared that he left it in a state which he did not intend to alter. Neal, 406. James, however, was all his life rather a bold liar than a good dissembler. It seems strange that they should not have attended to his Basilicon Doron, printed

All these, except the last, are taken from an account of the conference published by Barlow, and probably more favourable to the king and bishops than they deserve

making a weak defence; but the king's partiality and intemperance plead his apology. He is said to have complained of unfair representation in Barlow's account.

ymer, x

m of absolution, lay-baptism, etc.; and inveighs against the abuse of excommunication, against non-residence and pluralities, the oath ex officio, the sole exercise of ordination and jurisdiction by the bishop, conceiving that the dean and chapter should always assent, etc. And, in his predominant spirit of improvement, asks, "Why t

Id.

432; Winwo

ple's Speeches." This appears to have been written before the meeting of parliament. The French ambassadors, Sully and La Boderie, thou

James's Wor

rl. Hist

ons' Journ

n on themselves the reproach of inconstancy and levity. "But the acclamation of the house was, that it was a testimony of our duty, and no levity

f the earlier cases where the house had entered on matters of election. See also a rather curious letter of C

, page 155, etc.; Parl.

Jac. i

us are excommunicated ipso facto; consequently become incapable of being witnesses, of suing for

es himself had objected to their frequency. I cannot trace such a bill in the journals beyond the committee, nor is it in the statute-book. The fact is, that the king desired the house to confe

rks, i. 624; Jou

ns' Journal

Journa

Journa

, where this important document is preserved. The entry on the Journals, p. 243, contains onl

is session was more frequent than had ever been kno

ery day produces new matter of sedition, so fertile are their brains in ever buttering forth venome. Next, the Parlt. is now so very near an end, as this matter can suffer no longer delay. And thirdly, if this be not granted unto before they receive my answer unto their petition, it needs never to be moved, for the will of man or angel cannot devise a pleasing answer to their proposition, except I should pull the crown not only from my own head, but also from the head of all those that shall succeed unto mee, and lay it down at their feet. And that freedom of uttering my thoughts, which no extremity, strait nor peril of my

nes au

by the numeral 3; perhaps the Earl of Dunbar

Hoby, in a manuscript letter in the Museum, Sloane MSS. 4161, "that Hare and Hyde represented two tribunes of the people." But the Commons resented this infringement on their privileges, and after voting that Mr. Hare did not err in hi

Journa

tion of a single parliament, but the alterations necessary to give it effect (vol. i. p. 638), suggesting that the previous commission of lords of articles might be adopted for some, though not for all purposes. This of itself was a sufficient justification for the dilatoriness of the English parliament. Nor were the common lawyers who sat in the house much better pleased with Bacon's schemes for remodelling a

ter the king's accession, were natural subjects of the King of England. This is laid down, and irresistibl

trary proposition. "Allegiance," says Lord Bacon, "is of a greater extent and dimension than laws or kingdoms, and cannot consist by the laws merely, because it began before laws; it continueth after laws, and it is in vigour when laws are suspended and have not had their force."

series of precedents, evincing that the natives of Jersey, Guernsey, Calais, and even Normandy and Guienne, while

stopher Pigott for reflecting on the Scots n

mons' Jou

other would be the gainer. The very change of name to Great Britain was objected to. One said, we cannot legislate for Great Britain. P. 186. Another, with more astonishing sagaci

reign. Lord Bacon drew a well-written proclamation on that occasion. Bac

ons' Journ

] P.

ons' Journ

as had been captured by them before the 24th April, but orders all taken since to be restored to the owners. Rymer, xvi. 516. He had been used to call the Dutch rebels, and was probably kep

r ambassador at Madrid, "England never lost such an opportunity of winning honour and wealth, as by relinquishing the

nish court into making compensation to the merchants, wherein they succeeded. iii. 766. This is rendered very improbable by Salisbury's behaviour. It was Carte's mistake to rely too much on the despatche

xisted before the 25th Edward I., it is not very material whether it were so imposed, or granted by parliament. During the discussion, however, which took place in 1610, a record was discovered of 3 Edw. I. proving it to have been granted par

's increasing the duty on cloths is in the British Museum, Hargrave MSS. 32, and seems,

landed at that port under penalty of paying treble custom. Some merchants of Venice having landed wines elsewhere, an information was brought against them in the exchequer (1 Eliz.), and argued several times in the presence of all the judges. Eight were of opinion against the letters patent, among whom Dyer and Catlin, chief justices, as well for the principal matter of restraint in the landing of malmsies at the will and pleasure of the merchants, for that it was against the laws, statutes, and custom

Bacon,

of Law Tracts. See also the preface by Hargrave to Bates's case, in t

nd eight-pence a pound, in addition to two-pence already payable, on tobacco; inten

te Trials

al, "to be for ever hereafter paid to the king and his s

urnals,

, who sustained the cause of prerogative, must be apparent to every one. Id. 345. Sir John Davis makes somewhat a better defence; his argument is, that the king may lay an embargo on trade, so as to prevent it e

Hale's MS. Treatise de Jure Coron?, in Hargrave's Preface to Collection of La

n that I hear it bred generally much discomfort to see our monarchical power and royal prerogative strained so high, and made so transcendent every way, that if the practice should follow the positions, we are not likely to leave to ou

Journa

vol. ii. 159; in the

: "If any man shall affirm that men at the first ran up and down in woods and fields, etc., until they were taught by experience the necessity of government; and that therefore they chose some among themselves to order and rule the rest, giving them power and authority so to do; and that consequently all c

an angry letter of Bancroft, written about 1611 (Strype's Life of Whitgift, Ap

ays of the writ of prohibition, and the statutes of pr?munire, under these words, was very invidious towards the common lawyers, treating such rest

he most important circumstance, the king's proclamation suppressing the book, which yet is mentioned by Rapin and Carte, though the latter makes a false and disingenuous excuse

nwood, i

ts, ii. 162; Stat

erted in the reign of James by the inhabitants of these counties, and on reference to the twelve judges, according to Lord Coke, it was resolved that they were ancient English shires, and not within the jurisdiction of the council of Wales; "and yet," he subjoins, "the commission was not after reformed in all points as it ought to have been." Fourth Inst. 242. An elaborate argument in defence of the jurisdiction may be found in Bacon, ii. 122. And there are many papers on this su

Journals, 7th May, et post; Parl. Hist. 1124, e

at in all the lower houses these seven years past, especially these two last sessions, Ego pungor, ego carpor. Our fame and actions have been tossed like tennis-balls among them, and all that spite and malice durst do to disgrace and inflame us hath been used. To be short, this lower house by the

od affection, and in good truth she aimed well; our king talketh of his subjects' fear and subj

irtue, and without any sort of parallel in some other respects. Gross drunkenness is imputed even to some of the ladies who acted in the court pageants (Nug? Antiqu?, i. 348), whi

do; good Christians content themselves with his will revealed in his word; so it is presumption and high contempt

ptible from so wretched a pedant, as well as offensive to the indignant ears of those who knew an

at Paris to commence a negotiation for a marriage between Prince Charles and the second daughter of the late Kin

partialities of their respective sovereigns would permit for their own reputation. It is hardly necessary to observe, that James and the kingdom were chiefly indebted to Cecil for the tranquillity that attended the accession of the former to the throne. I will take this opportunity of noticing that the learned and worthy compiler of the catalogue of the Lansdowne manuscripts in the Museum has thought fit not only to charge Sir Michael Hicks with venality, but to add: "It is certain that articles among these papers contribute to justify very strong suspicions, that neither of the secretary's masters [Lord Burleigh and Lord Salisbury] was alt

to Salisbury, was "not of the succession of Cleves and Juliers, but whether the house of Austria and the church of Rome, both now on the wane, shall recover their lustre and greatness in

egotiations of Edmondes, p. 347. Miss Aikin, looking to his want of constitutional principle, is more unfavourable, and perhaps on the whole justly

ty was very much offended, and told him he spoke foolishly, and said that he was not defended by his laws, but by God, and so gave the Lord Coke, in other words, a very sharp reprehension, both for that and other things; and withal told him that Sir Thomas Crompton (judge of the admiralty) was as good a man as Coke; my Lord Coke having then, by way of exception, used some speech against Sir Thomas Crompton. Had not my lord treasurer, most humbly on his knee, use

l later, he speaks in a very different manner of Bates's case, and d

ith brick or stone, under penalty of being proceeded against by the attorney-general in the star-chamber. Rymer, xvii. 107 (1618), 144 (1619), 607 (1624). London neverth

irm, neither their own behaviour, nor that of their wives and daughters, who took the worst means of repairing the ruin their extravagance had caused, redounded to their honour. The king's comparison of them to ships in a river and in the sea is we

f proclamations even in the midst of the Tudor period. "The king, it is said, may make a proclamation quoad terrorem populi, to put them in fear of his displeasure,

nwood, i

arte, i

feudal resource, calling on all who held ￡40 a year in chivalry (whether of the crown or not, as it seems) to receive knighthood, or to pay a composition. Rymer, xvi. 530. The object of this was of course to raise money from

. penes

Carte,

n, in Kenne

26) was repealed a few years

ns, as belonging to hereditary though not to elective princes. Id. 493. This silly argument is only worth notice, as a proof what erroneous

ference, requested, by the mouth of Chief Justice Coke, to be excused. This was probably a disappointment to Lord Chancellor Egerton, who had moved

ls, May 31; Commons

's memorial above mentioned

19, 20; Bacon,

ly defends the prerogative of laying impositio

s, and tore all their bills before their faces in the banqueting-house at Whitehall

mden's Annals of James

arte, i

2 Repor

te Trials

und proofs of it in the queen's reign; though I cannot at present quote my authority. In a former age, the judges had

of Edward III., for saying, that "the king, being excommunicated (i.e. if he should be excommunicated) by the pope, might be lawfully deposed and killed by any one, which killing would not be murder, being the execution of the supreme sentence of the p

500, 518, 522; Cr

The king told the judges, he thought his prerogative as much wounded if

ames I., p. 125. He was too much af

.; Wilson, ibid., 704, 705; Bacon's Works, ii. 574.

h Hist. 56; Neal, i.

te Trials

717; Selden's Life

arte, i

ii. 23; Lodge's Illu

wood, iii

f circumstances about the king's accession, which seems entitled to some credit, that on its being proposed that she should walk at the queen's funeral, she answered wit

ging to be brought before them by habeas corpus, being informed that it is designed to remove her far from those courts of justice where she ought to be tried and condemned, or cleared, to remote parts, whose courts she holds unfitted for her offence. "And if your lordships may not or will not grant unto me the ordinary relief of a distressed subject, then I beseech you become humble intercessors to his majesty that I may receive s

party seem to have relied upon her; and so late as 1610, she

e queen's life-time. Secret Correspo

te Trials

ce's illness, which was an epidemic typhus fever. The report of his physicians after dissection may also be read in many books. Nature might possibly have overcome the disorder, if an empirical doctor had not insisted on continually b

ave thrown out in passion against a favourite she hated. On Henry's death the first suspicion fell of course on the papists. Winwood, iii. 410. Burnet doubts whether his aversion to popery did not hasten his death. And there is a rema

1. That Overbury's death was occasioned, not merely by Lady Somerset's revenge, but by his possession of important secrets, which in his passion he had threatened Somerset to divulge. 2. That Somerset conceived himself to have a hold over the king by the possession of the same or some other secrets, and used indirect threats of revealing them. 3. That the king was in the utmost terror at hearing of these measures; as is proved by a passage in Weldon's Memoirs, p. 115, which, after being long ascribed to his lib

ggested itself to the reader, appear probable to my judgment on weighing the whole case. Overbury was an ambitious, unprincipled man; and it seems more likely than anything else, that James had listened too much to some c

iew reported by Burnet, contains strong charges against Buckingham. Arch?ologia, vol. xvii. 280. But no consequences resulted from this; James was either reconciled to his favourite before his death, or felt himself too old for a struggle. Somerset seems to have tampered a little with the popular party in the beginning of the next reign. A speech of Sir Robert Cotton's in 1625 (Parl. Hist. ii. 145) praises him, comparatively at least with his successor in royal favour; and he was one of those against whom informations were brought i

s the despatches of Beaumont, the French ambassador, to prove the connection of the conspirators with the Spanish plenipotentiary. But it may be questioned whether he knew any more than the government gave out. If Raleigh had ever shown a discretion bearing the least proportion to his genius, we might reject the whole story as improbable. But it is to be remembered that there had long been a catholic faction, who fixed their hopes on Arabella; so that the conspiracy, though extremely injudicious, was not so perfectly unintelligible as it appears

pare it; but he only answered, "I mun have the land, I mun have it for Carr." He gave him, however, ￡12,000 instead. But the estate was worth ￡5000 per annum. This ruin of the prospects of a man far too intent on aggrandisement impelled him once more into the labyrinth of fatal and dishonest speculations. Cayley, 89, etc.; Somers Tracts,

as empowered to name office

s even reason to suspect that he betrayed the secret of Raleigh's voyage to Gondomar, before he sailed. Hardwicke, State Papers, i. 398. It is said in Mr. Cayley's Life of Rale

of Prince Henry and the infanta on their marriage; and Cornwallis was directed to propose this formally to the court of Madrid. Id. p. 201

rcester, Digby, Weston, Calvert, as well as Buckingham, whose connections were such, were in the Spanish party. Those reputed to be je

e unconstitutional directions to the electors, contained, as h

owns that at the last parliament there was "a strange kind of beast called undertaker," etc. Parl. Hist. i. 1180. Yet this coaxing language was oddly mingled with sallies of his pride and prerogative notions. It is

quote the two volumes published at Oxford in 1766;

Id. 10

wer their complaint. The bishop laid the matter before the Lords, who all declared that it was unbecoming for any lord of parliament to make answer to any one in that place; "quod non consentaneum

in 1621, p.

Id.

] Ca

ter. These are marked by the deep sagacity and extensive observation of the writer. One passage should be quoted in justice to Bacon. "As far as it may lie in you, let no arbitrary power be intruded; the people of this kingdom love the laws thereof, and nothing will oblige them more than a confidence of the free enjoying of them: what the nobles upon an occasion once said in parliament, 'Nolumus leges Angli? mutari,' is imprinted in the hearts of all the people." I may add that with all Bacon's pliancy, there are fewer over-strai

m the worst of characters. "Surely," says the latter, "never so many parts and so base and abject a spirit tenanted together in any one earthen cottage as in this man." It is a striking proof of the splendour of Bacon's genius, that it was unanimously acknowledged in his own age amidst so much that should excite contempt. He had indeed ingratiated himself with every preceding parliament through his incomparable ductility; having take an active part in their complaints of grievances in 1604, before he became attorney-general, and even on many occasions aft

ilosophy had never existed, there would be enough in his political wr

s in 1621, v

ebates,

e the right or title of a baron of parliament; nor could admit the term of the commons' court of parliament; "because all your house together, without theirs, doth make no court of parliament." 4th March, 1606. Lords' Journals. Nevertheless the Lords did not scruple almost immediately afterwards, to d

s part of the Commons, were the members for the cinque po

e writes to his correspondent on May 11, that the execution had not

ich was supposed to be neglected by King James, and consequently in opposition to him, will carry people against common justice and humanity." And again at the bottom: "For the honour of Englishmen, and indeed of human nature, it were to be hoped these debates were not truly taken, there being so many motions contrary to the laws of the land, the laws of parliament, and

n for not yielding to it. One said that impositions of this nature overthrew the liberty of all the subjects of this kingdom; and if the king may impose such taxes, then are we but villains, and lose all our liberties. It produced an order that the matter be examined before the house, the petitioners to be heard by council, and all the lawyers of the house to be present. Debates of 1621, vol. ii. 252; Journals

21, p. 14; Hatsell'

, p. 114, et

l. ii. 1

Id.

There had certainly been a very great increase of wealth under James, especially to the country gentlemen; of which their style of building is an evident proof. Yet in this very session complaints had been made of the want of money, and fall in the price of lands (vol. i. p. 16); and an a

P. 242

each of privilege. Doubtless the house showed great and even excessive moderation in it; for we can hardly doubt that Sa

P. 261

] P.

] P.

] P.

] P.

] P.

] P.

344; Parl. Hist.

. p. 155 (4to edit.); D'Israeli's Character of Ja

made the same answer: at last they told him they had resolved not to deliver it, unless they were admitted all together. Whereupon his majesty, wonderfully incensed, sent them all away, re infecta, and said that he would come into parliament himself, and bring them all to the bar." This petition, I believe, did not relate to any general grievances, but to a question of their own privileges, as to their precedence of Scots peers. Wilson, ubi supra. But several of this lar

of James has sketched the characters of t

s ears in publishing. Some outrageous reflections on the personal character of the king could hardly be excelled by modern licentiousness. Proclamations about this time against excess

tives less satisfactory. Some pamphlets of the time, in the second volume of the Somers Tracts, may be read with interest; and Howell's Letters, being written from

improbable to be lightly credited. For admit that no change was made in each man's rate according to the increase of wealth and diminution of the value of money, the amount must at least have been equal to what it had been; and to suppose the contributors to have prevailed on the assessors to underrate them, is rather contrar

ying the intended toleration of papists. He wished to get further pledges of support from parliament before he plunged into a war, and was ver

arl. Hi

liams, takes his part. Carte, however, thought him guilty (p. 116); and the unanimous vote of the peers is much against him, since that house was not wholly governed by Buckingham. See too the "Life of Nicholas Farrar" in Wordsworth's Ecc

oke says on this act, and on the gener

P. H

Id.

s. Hutchinson, whose good word he would not have undeservedly obtained. Mem. of Col. Hutchinson, p. 65. I am aware that he was not the perfect saint as well as martyr which his pane

ssolution of the first parliament. In fact, he was much more set upon

rmer, while in Spain, had professed himself a papist-that it is false, and was never said by Bristol. It is singular that Hume should know so positively what Bristol did not say in 1624, when it is notorious

. Hist. vo

] Id

e submissive awe and lowliness of loyal subjects, we cannot but receive exceeding comfort and contentment in the frame and constitution of this highest court, wherein not only the prelates, nobles, and grandees, but the commons of all degrees, have t

parliaments by incroaching on his prerogative; for in his messages he had told them that he must then use new councils. In all Christian kingdoms there were parliaments anciently, till the monarchs seeing their turbulent spirits, stood upon their prerogatives, and overthrew them all, except with us. In foreign countries the people look

s, that the liberties of the people depended on favou

i. 147; Lords' Journals. A few

book of history. He held ten proxies in the king's first parliament, as Buckingham did thirteen. Lingard, ix. 328. In the second Pembroke had had only five, but the duke still came with thirteen. Lords' Jour

Hist. 125; H

self-aggrandisement," is surely not apparent; though he might be more partial to Spain than we may think right, or even though he mig

es against Bristol as to facts depending in great measure on the king's sole testimony. Bristol petitioned the house "to take in consideration of what consequence such a precedent might be; and thereon most humbly to move his majesty for the declining, at least, of his majesty's accusation and testimony." Id. 98. The house ordered two questions on this to be put to the judges: 1. Whether, in case of treason o

he corroborated his favourite's narrative by his testimony." But no a

of it; and to-day, when the lord keeper drew out the commission to have read it, they sent four of their own body to his majesty to let him know how dangerous this abruption would be to the state, and beseech him the parliament might sit but two days-he answered not a minute."-15

shworth,

eir obeisance; and so went out without any answer affirmative or negative. In Kent the whole county denied, saying that subsidies were matters of too high a nature for them to meddle withal, and that they durst not deal therewith, lest, hereafter they might be called in question." July 22, et post. In Harleian MSS. xxxvii. fol. 192, we find a letter from the king to the deputy lieutenant and justices of every county, informing them that he had dissolved the last parliament because the disordered passion of some members of that house, contrary to the good inclination of the greater and wiser sort of them, had frustrated the grant of four subsidies, and three-fifteenths, whe

worth's Ab

asion, it was thought, would not gain it; and for judicial courses, it would not hold against the subject that would stand upon the right of his own property, and against the fundamental constitutions of the kingdom. The last resort was to a proclamation; for in star-chamber it might be punishable, and thereupon it rested." There follows much more; it seemed to be agreed that there was such a necessity as might ju

e council, and of the bold spirit with which they were resisted. Curiosities of Literature, New Series, iii. 381. But this ingenious author is too much imbued with "th

shworth,

England. Parl. Hist. 310. He had nothing to say when pressed with this in the next parliament, but that he had misgrounded his opinion upon a ce

. 1-234; Parl. Hist. 24

a parliament, the king said, he did abomina

Mede's Letters in

bala, part ii. 217. See what is s

should commit any robberies, etc., which by martial law ought to be punished with death, by such summary course as is agreeable to martial law, etc.

dent by what follows; where we are told that he had an interview with the Duke of Buckingham, when they were reconciled; and "his grace had the bishop's consent with a little asking, that he would be his grace's faithful servant in the next session of parliament, and was allowed to hold up

ally on the article of the habeas corpus, occupy near two hundred c

l for the Crown. One of these, Serjeant Ashley, having argued in behalf of the prerogative in a high tone, such as had been usual in the late reign, was ordered into cust

rave MSS.

arl. Hi

whole statute with the preamble, which I omit for the sake

arl. Hi

hworth Ab

l. Hist.

greater. P. 434. This minority was considerable; but it is chiefly to be noticed, that it contained the more exemplary portion of the clergy; no scandalous or absolutely illiterate incumbent, of whom there was a very large number, being a nonconformist. This general enforcement of conformity, however i

road; and that so far, as some of our men ordained in foreign parts have been pronounced to be no lawful ministers."-Vol. i. p. 382. It is evident, by some passages in Strype, attentively considered, that natives regularly ordained abroad in the presbyterian churches were admitted to hold prefermen

sserted, if I mistake not the sense, in the canons of 1606. Overall's Convocation Book, 179, etc. Yet Laud had been reproved by the university of Oxford in 1604, for maintaining, in his exercise for bachelo

so far from maintaining the divine and indispensable right of ep

559 (Somers Tracts, i. 65), and compar

ual as afterwards. One of Bound's recommendations was that no feasts should be given on that day, "except by lords, knights, and persons of quality;" for which unlucky reservation his adversaries did not forget to deride him. Fuller's Church History, p. 227. This writer describes in his quaint style the abstinence from sport

e of Laud, 15; Ful

cts, turning their knowledge therein to gratify their sensuality, have of late more than in times past broken and contemned such abstinence, which hath been used in this realm upon the Fridays and Saturdays, the embering days and other days commonly called vigils, and in the time commonly called Lent, and other accustomed times; the king's majesty considering that due and godly abstinence is a mean to virtue and to subdue men's bodies to their

lesh also. But "because no manner of person shall misjudge of the intent of this statute," it is enacted that whosoever shall notify that any eating of fish or forbearing of flesh mentioned therein is of any necessity for the saving of the soul of man, or that it is the service of God, otherwise than as other politic laws are and be; that then such persons shall be punished as spreaders

of devilish and carnal appetite;" and butchers, etc., "ministering to such foul lust of the flesh," were severely mulcted. Strype's Annals, ii. 208. But in 1576 another proclamation to the same effect uses no such hard words, and protests strongly against any superstitious interpretation of its motive. Life of Grindal, p. 226. So also in 1579 (Strype's Annals, ii. 608), and, as far as I have observed, in all of a later date, the encouragement of the navy and fishery is set forth as their sole ground. In 1596, Whitgift, by the queen's command, issued letters to the bishops of his province, to take order that the fasting-days, Wednesday and Friday, shou

er, for two. Strype's Memorials, ii. 82. The act above mentioned for encouragement of the fishery, 5th Eliz. c. 5, provides that ￡1 6s. 8d. shall be paid for granting every licence, and 6s. 8d. annually afterwards, to the poor of the parish. But no licence was to be granted for eating beef at any time of the year, or veal from Michaelmas to the first of May. A melancholy privation to our countrymen! but,

e orthodox Anglicans continued to make a show of fasting. The following extracts from Pepys' diary are, perhaps, characteristic of the class. "I called for a dish of fish which we had for dinner, this being the firs

Wilson

them not to pass this bill, being so directly against his proclamation. Id

sorry welcome; but this king being under a necessity of compliance with them, resolved to grant them their desires in that particular, to the end that they might grant his also in the aid required, when that obstruction was removed. The Sabbatarians took the benefit of this oppo

ittle connected with this work, I mention Strype's Annals, vol. i. p. 118

Collie

e's Annals,

e's Whitgif

Elizabeth having begun to read some of the fathers, Bishop Cox writes of it with some disapprobation

e king's peculiar displeasure, but for certain propositions as to the nature of the Deity, which James called atheistical, but which were in fact Arian. The letters on this subject in Winwood are curious. Even at this time, the king is said to have spoken moderately of predestination as

untries, vol. iii. The English divines sent to this synod were decidedly inclined to Calvinism, but the

urt language, indeed, shifted so very soon after this, that Antonio de Dominis, the famous half-converted Archbishop of Spalato, is said to have invented the name of doctrinal puritans for those who distinguished themselves by holding the Calvinistic tenets. Yet the synod of Dort was in 1618; while De Dominis left England not later than 1622. Buckingham seems to have gone very warmly into Laud's scheme of excluding the Calvinists. The latter gave him a list of divines on Charles's accession, distinguishing their names by O. and P. for orthodox and puritan; including several tenets in the latter denomination, besides those of the quinquarticular controversy; such as the indispensable observance of the Lord's day, the indiscrimination of bishops and presbyters, etc. Life of Laud, 119. The influence of Laud became so great that to preach in favour of C

commanding all jesuits and priests to quit the realm, dated in 1603, he declares himself personally "so much beholden to the new bishop of Rome for his kind office and private temporal carriage towards us in many things, as we shall ever be ready to requite the same towards him as Bishop of Rome in state and condition of a secular prince." Rymer, xvi. 573. This is explained by a passage in the memoirs of Sully (l. 15). Clement VIII., though before Elizabeth's death he had abetted the project of placing Arabella on the throne, thought it expedient, after this design had failed, to pay some court to James, and had refused to accept the dedication of a work written against him, besid

, "partly by this round dealing with the puritans, and partly by some extraordinary favour, have grown mightily in number, courage, and influence."-"If the gospel shall quail, and popery prevail, it will be imputed principally unto your great counsellors, who either procure

x; and still more so upon those who had to pay for their scruples. It was proposed in parliament, but with the usual fate of humane suggestions, that husbands going to church, sh

ngard, i

icion that the nuncio at Brussels was privy to the conspiracy; though this ought not to be asserted as an historical fact. Whether the offence of Garnet went beyond misprision of treason has been much controverted. The catholic writers maintain that he had no knowledge of the conspiracy, except by having heard it in confession. But this rests altogether on his word; and the prevarication of which he has been proved to be guilty (not to mention the damning circumstance that he was taken at Hendlip in concealment along with the other conspirators), makes it difficult for a candid man to acquit him of a thorough participation in their guilt. Compare Townsend's Accusations of History against the Church of Rome (1825), p. 247, containing extracts from some important documents in the State Paper-Office, not as yet published, with State Trials, vol. ii.; and see Lingard, ix. 160, etc. Yet it should be kept in mind that it was easy for a few artful persons to keep on the alert by indistinct communications a credulous multitude whose daily food was rumour; and the general hopes of the English Romanists at the moment are not ev

tented spirit, and rather destitute of religion than a zealot for popery, which he did not, I believe, openly profess, should have mingled in so flagitious a design. There is indeed a remarkable letter in Winwood, vol. iii. p. 287, which tends to corroborate the suspicions entertained of him. But this letter is from Salisbur

Jac. I.

ed by the king himself, in his Apology for the Oath of Allegiance (edit. 1619), p. 46, that Bellarmine plainly confounds the oath of allegiance with

declaration of the queen's right to the crown, notwithstanding her excommunication. But, though he evide

as Buckingham lets him know, was of a quite contrary opinion; for, "though he would not by any means have a more severe course held than his laws appoint in that case, yet there are many reasons why there should be no mitigation above that which his laws have exerted, and his own conscience telleth him to be fit." He afterwards professes "to account it a baseness in a prince to show such a desire of the match [this was in 1617] as to slack anything in his course of government, much more in pr

d have ever sincerely co-operated for the restoration of the Palatinate, or even withdrawn the Spanish troops from it, is neither rendered probable by the general policy of that government,

ght be easily possessed by any association that could command seven or eight hundred men; and that after having made such a settlement, it would be easy to take the Spanish flotilla, and attempt the conquest of Jamaica and St. Domingo. This made so great an impression on the mind of Buckingham, that, long afterwards in 1628, he entered into a contract with Gustavus Adolphus, wh

arrangement, which was probably intended to take place only in the event of his banishment from England. The share that Gustavus appears to have taken in so wild a plan is rather extraordinary, and may expose the whole to some suspicion. It is not clear h

ans. Hist. Gust. Adolph. i. 130. But that prince, in 1627, laid before the diet of Sweden a plan f

Conway's, since published (Ellis, iii. 154), that the king was in great distress at the engagement for a complete immunity from penal laws for the catholics, entered into by the

icke Papers

places much beyond the original. If Hume knew nothing but the translation, as is most probable, we may well be astonished at his way of dismissing this business; that "the

yle of approbation, and so as to give the utmost meaning to the prince's compliments, expressing his satisfactio

d been sent over. Howell's Letters, p. 140. Bristol and Buckingham charged each other with advising Charles to embrace the Romish religion; and he himself, in a letter to Bristol,

worth; Cab

hat the laws against recusants might be put in execution (Id. 1408);

Rush

s as Earl of Holland), the king's ambassador at Paris for this marriage-tr

oi l'ayant assemblé exprès pour cela le jour d'hier." The pope agreed to appoint a bishop for England, nominated by the King of France. Oct. 22. The oath of allegiance, however, was a stumbling-block; the king could not change it by his own authority, and establish another in parliament, "où la faction des puritains prédomine, de sorte qu'ils peuvent ce qu'ils veulent." Buckingham, however, promised "de nous faire obtenir l'assurance que votre majesté désire tant, que les catholiques de ce pais ne seront jamais inquiétés pour le raison du serment de fidélité, du quel votre majesté a si souvent ou? parler." Dec. 22. He speaks the same day of an audience he had of King James, who promised never to persecute his catholic subjects, nor desire of them any oath which spoke of the pope's spiritual authority, "mais seulement un acte de la reconnoissance de la domination temporelle qui Dieu lui a donnée, et qu'ils auroient en considération de votre majesté, et de la confiance que vous

of state should also sign, that all his Roman catholic subjects should enjoy more freedom as to their religion than they could have had by any articles agreed on with Spain; not being molested in their persons or property for their prof

ublic act, whereof a copy to be delivered to the pope or his minister, and the same to bind his majesty and the prince's successors for ever." Id. p. 552. The ambassadors expressed the strongest indignation at this proposal, on which the French did not think fit to insist. In all this wretched negotiation, James was as much the dupe as he had been in

n that subject, was assured by him that he was desirous of re-entering the fold of the church. Wilson in Rennet, p. 786, note by Wellwood. I have not

Rushworth; Lingard, ix

our own country, call to mind so many rebellions of old time, and some yet fresh in memory; ye shall not find that God ever prospered any rebellion against their natural and lawful prince, but contrariwise, that the rebels were overthrown and slain, and such as were taken prisoners dreadfully executed." They illustrate their doctrine by the most preposterous example I have ever seen alle

popish successor. Nor was this theory very consistent with the aid and countenance given to the United Provinces. Our learned churchmen, however, cared very little for the Dutch. They were more pu

ght was sent to the Gate-house prison, where he remained two years. Laud was the chief

on-juror, is Englishman enough to blame the doctrines of Sibthorp and Mainwaring, and, consistently

ishop's continuance in his function, on pretence that, by some contemptible old canon, he had become irregular in consequence of this accidental homicide; and Spelman disgraced himself by writing a treatise in support of this doctrine. James, however, had more sense than the antiquary, and less ill

illiers, in order to supplant Somerset; which, though well-meant, did not become his function. Even in the delicate business of promising toleration to the catholics by the secret articles of the treaty with Spain, he gave satisfaction to the king (Hardwic

am sorry to hear they (the bishops) are so habituated to flattery that they seem not to know of any other duty that belongs to them." See Ellis's Letters, iii. 228, for the account Mede gives of the manner in which the heads of houses f

it for the reverence due to his majesty," yet he "does not know any formed act of either house (for neither the remonstrance nor votes of the last day were such), that was not agreeable to the wisdom and justice of great cour