cation enactments were not of the nature of laws, until confirmed by parliament, was understood by some, and suspected by others. For the purpose of removing this difficulty, the judges and law officers were summoned to meet the sovereign in the Star-chamber, where several questions bearing on the point were submitted to them. The lords of the privy council, it appears, felt no scruple in raising the prerogative to almost any height on such matters. The judges, and still more strenuously Coke the attorney-general, ventured to urge the opposing claims of the law. But in the end the majority were pleased to affirm that the king might give the force of law to regulations for the government of the Church without waiting for the consent of parliament, and that the royal commissioners might be empowered to see them administered. It was also declared that persons framing petitions to the king, procuring to them numerous signatures, and stating therein that many thousands of his majesty's subjects would be discontented if the suit of such petitions should be denied, were guilty of an offence approaching very near to felony and treason, and might be fined at discretion. Armed with this spurious authority, James resolved to deprive the nonconformist clergy of their livings, and at the same time to preclude the expression of any popular sentiment in their favour. Tyranny has made alarming progress, when it not only has the power to inflict wrong, but to prevent all expression of complaint under it.

Character of

of York.

It is a relief to turn from these instances of intolerance supplied by the ministers of religion, and of corruption and subserthe Puritans viency afforded by the guardians of the law, to the inaccording to telligence and humane integrity of the following passage the Archbishop from a letter of Dr. Hutton, at this time Archbishop of York. Writing to lord Cranbourne, the venerable prelate remarks,"I have received letters from your lordship, and others of his majesty's most honourable privy council, containing two points. First, that the Puritans be proceeded against according to law, except they conform themselves. Secondly, that good care be had unto greedy patrons, that none be admitted in their places but such as are conformable, and otherwise worthy for their virtue and learning. I have written to the three bishops of the province, and, in their absence, to their chancellors, to have a special care of this service; and therein have sent copies of your letters, and will take present order within my own diocese. I wish with all my heart that the like order were taken and given, not only to all bishops, but to all magistrates and justices, &c., to proceed against papists and recusants, who of late, partly by this round dealing against Puritans, and partly by reason of this extraordinary favour, have grown mightily in number, courage, and influence.

"The Puritans, whose fanatical zeal I dislike, though they differ in ceremonies and accidents, yet they agree with us in substance of religion; and I think all, or the most part of them, love his majesty and the pre* Neal, ii. 35-37. Winwood, ii. 44. Dalrymple's Memorials, i. 22—25.

sent estate, and I hope will yield to conformity. But the Papists are opposite and contrary in very substantial points of religion, and cannot but wish the pope's authority and popish religion to be established. I assure your lordship 'tis high time to look unto them; very many are gone from all places to London, and some are come down to this country in great jollity, almost triumphantly. But his majesty, as he hath been brought up in the gospel, and understands religion exceeding well, so he will protect, maintain, and advance it even unto the end; so that if the gospel shall quail and popery prevail, it will be imputed principally to your great counsellors, who either procure or yield to grant toleration to some. Good my lord Cranbourne, let me put you in mind that you were born and brought up in true religion. Your worthy father was a worthy instrument to banish superstition and to advance the gospel: imitate him in this service especially. As for other things, I confess I have not to deal in state matters; yet, as one that honoureth and loveth his most excellent majesty with all my heart, I wish less wasting of the treasure of the realm, and more moderation of the lawful exercise of hunting, both that the poor men's corn may be less spoiled, and other his majesty's subjects more spared*."

What renders the candour of this judgment with regard to the Puritans the more creditable to them and its author is, that the writer had been a close observer of the spirit and conduct of that party from the early part of the last reign; and in another paper, which still exists, has presented a vigorous outline of the Puritan controversy, and of the changes it underwent, from the accession of Elizabeth to the times of which we are now treating.

Persecution of the Puritans.

But timidity often leads to cruelty, the inordinate fear of evil producing a readiness to employ inordinate means of protection against it; and thus the fears of James, which connected puritanism with every attribute of disloyalty and rebellion, taught him to provide for his own safety by shutting his ears against every plea that might be urged in favour of his supposed enemies. "The Puritans," said an observer at this time, "go down on all sides; and though our new bishop of London proceeds but slowly, yet at last he hath deprived, silenced, or suspended all that continue disobedient; in which course he hath won himself great commendations of gravity, wisdom, learning, mildness, and temperance, even among that faction; and indeed is held every way the most efficient man of that coat: yet those that are deprived wrangle, and will not be put down, but appeal to the parliament, and seek prohibitions by law; but the judges have all given their opinions that the proceedings against them are lawful, and so they cannot be relieved that way. Then they take another course, to ply the king with petitions, the ringleaders whereof were Sir Richard and Sir Valentine Knightley, Sir Edward Montague, with some * Winwood, ii. 40.

three or four score of gentlemen more, that joined in a petition for the ministers of Northamptonshire last week, which was so ill taken, that divers of them were convened before the council, and told what danger they had put themselves in by these associations, and that thus combining themselves in a cause against which the king had his mislike, both by public act and proclamation, was little less than treason; that the subscribing with so many names were armata preces, and tended to sedition, as had been manifestly seen heretofore both in Scotland, France, and Flanders, in the beginning of those troubles*." Another contemporary remarks, "The poor Puritan ministers have been ferreted out of all corners, and some of them suspended, others deprived of their livings. Certain lecturers are silenced, and a crew of gentlemen of Northamptonshire who put up a petition to the king on their behalf, told roundly of their boldness both at the council-table and star-chamber; and Sir Francis Hastings, for drawing the petition and standing to it when he had done, is put from his lieutenancy and justiceship of the peace in his shire. Sir Edward Montague and Sir Valentine Knightley, for refusing to subscribe to a submission, have the like sentence. The rest, upon an acknowledgment of a fault, have no more said to them +." Again we find "The Puritans about Royston, to the number of about seven or eight-and-twenty, presented to the king, as he was hunting there, a petition in favour of their ministers, a copy thereof I shall be able to send you by the next. The king took in ill part this disorderly proceeding, commanded them presently to depart, and to depute ten of the wisest among them to declare their grievances, which ten were sent to the council, who, after examination, gave them their mittimus. Upon their bail they are bound over to be ready to answer the matter before the lords when they shall be summoned ‡.

These indications of sympathy with the cause of the Puritans, and shown by persons of high local influence, are in accordance with what we have seen in the conduct of the parliament, and serve to place the weakness of the court policy in a still stronger light. Considerable difficulty now arose both from the number of the ministers who proved nonconformists, and from the number and weight of the persons who continued to appear as their advocates. According to a writer, whose work § was known to James and deemed unanswerable, not less than three hundred nonconforming ministers were sufferers by the proceedings now * Winwood, ii. 49.

† Ibid. 48.

Ibid. 36.

§ Calderwood's Altare Damascenum. "Anno secundo post adventum Regis in Angliam 300 ministri, vel libertate conscionandi mulctati, vel beneficio privati, vel excommunicationis fulmine icti, vel in carcerem conjecti, vel solum vertere coacti ; et restauratæ Papatus reliquiæ, quarum usus plerisque locis ante obitum felicissima Elizabethæ obsoleverat." Pref. James, after reading this book, was observed to be "somewhat pensive," and a prelate inquiring the reason, the king "told him he had read such a book; on which the prelate, not willing that such an affair should trouble his majesty, said they would answer it; he replied, not without some passion, What will you answer, man? There is nothing here than scripture, reason,

instituted. "It is hard," observes a contemporary courtier, "to say what course were best to take; for that more show themselves opposite than was suspected; and the bishops themselves are loth to proceed too rigorously in casting out and depriving so many well-reputed of for life and learning, only the king is constant to have all come to conformity. Though he seek to be very private and retired where he is, yet he is much importuned with petitions on their behalf, and with foolish prophecies of danger to ensue." In order to meet this perplexity, the court descended in some measure from the high ground it had taken, consenting that men should "be pressed (for the time only) to conformity; and it being discerned that the number of refusers would still be great, they have since fallen yet lower, accepting of some the use of the cross and surplice only, of others only a promise to use them, and of some the profession of their judgment only that they may be used, without pressing them to the use of them at all*"

correct views

We have dwelt the longer on the circumstances and the exact nature of the controversy between the court and the Puritans at this crisis, as a distinct acquaintance with their particulars Importance of is strictly necessary to an accurate knowledge of English with regard to history under the house of Stuart. It is the confession of the Puritan controversy. their enemies that to this people we "owe the whole freedom of our constitution;" and the character of that religious struggle, which has given this secular importance to their history, is but very partially and imperfectly exhibited in our most popular histories. The principles which made them Protestants made them Puritans, teaching them to regard oppression as an evil to be resisted, whether practised by popes, by princes, or by a Protestant clergy. Animated by these principles, and persecuted by the crown and the court clergy, the Puritans not only became connected with every popular movement, but gave to every such movement the peculiar energy of religious motives. The interests of religion and of civil freedom were seen to be every where interwoven, so that to forsake either would be to give an ascendancy to the enemies of both; and, what affected the Puritans greatly more was, that by such conduct they would expose themselves to those penalties in a future world, which they feared much beyond any that could be inflicted by man. It is confessed that their views of freedom, especially in regard to religion, were not in all respects equally enlightened; but they were views sufficiently just to render these persons the great conservators of English liberty as then secured

and fathers."" Pref. ed. 1708. James would hardly have said this, if Calderwood had magnified the number of sufferers among the Puritan clergy from some fifty to three hundred, as affirmed by Heylin. Aer. Rediviv. p. 367.

"A short dialogue, proving that the ceremonies, and some other corruptions now in question, are defended by none other arguments than such as the papists have heretofore used and our Protestant writers have long since answered." 1005. Parl. Hist. ii. 1136. Neal, ii. 38, 39.

by law, and the means of transmitting it to future generations in a form still more safe and ample. At this time, the alternative placed before them was to forego the public worship of their Maker, or to conform to usages which they believed to be contrary to his will. Had their persecutors allowed them to form separate assemblies, much of their just ground of complaint would have been removed; but from any separation they were prohibited by the sternest interdicts. These interdicts show it to have been well understood, that not a few were ready to avail themselves of such a liberty had it been conceded; and a small space would probably have sufficed to remove the scruples of such as might not at once have seen the propriety of following so untried a course; for it must be remembered that hitherto liberty and uniformity had been the watchwords of the reformed churches hardly less than of the Romish, the only difference being that the creed and the formularies were described as of a Protestant, and not of a Catholic origin. The existence of a national church allowing the operation of a vigorous dissent was unknown, except where the two great bodies of Protestants and Catholics were so considerable as to make some such adjustment unavoidable. This was long the state of things in France.

CHAPTER V.

Case of Pound, a Catholic-State of the English Catholics-The Gunpowder con spiracy-Character of the conspirators, and progress of their enterprise-Their ulterior plans-Letter to lord Mounteagle-Failure of the plot-Apprehension and fate of the conspirators-Case of the Jesuit missionaries-Garnet-Meeting of parliament-King's speech-New penal laws against Catholics-Justice of these enactments considered.

a Catholic.

THE penal laws against Catholics were on the whole less rigorously enforced than at some intervals during the last reign. We Case of Pound, find, however, that these enactments were not so far allowed to sleep but that cases of hardship occurred; and these instances were deemed the more grievous by the Christians of that communion, as being contrary to the indulgence with which they had flattered themselves on the king's accession. One case of this nature which occurred at this juncture served to mark but too vividly the spirit of the times. It is thus mentioned in a letter to Winwood. "This Starchamber day was determined the case of one Pound, a gentleman who accused serjeant Philips of injustice for condemning to death a neighbour of his only for entertaining a Jesuit. The lords by their sentence declared the condemnation to be lawful, condemned Pound to lose one of his ears here in London, and the other in the country where he