little nags," the road "extremely foul and deep; " and by sunrise that cold morning,-as the light woke up the slumbering city, as the smoke rose through the quaint chimneys from ten thousand hearths, the three presbyters entered the metropolis. 1 They lodged in the city close to London Stone, 2 in a house which was wont to be inhabited by the Lord Mayor, or by one of the Sheriffs. St. Antholin's (or St. Anthony's) Church, connected with the mansion by a gallery, became their place of worship. There they soon had throngs as great as at their own communions, and daily the crowds increased to hear Mr. Henderson, so that "from the first appearance of day to the shutting in the light, the church was never empty." The lodgings by London Stone became the scene of many an earnest conference, and there Baillie wrote the letters and journals which afford us such an insight into public proceedings and religious life in London during that eventful winter.

The Scotch Commissioners soon saw the famous petition, from "the town of London, and a world of men, for the abolition of bishops and deans and all their appurtenances, " and were consulted about the time of its presentation. They seem to have recommended delay, till Parliament should pull down " Canterbury and some prime bishops;" and Convocation should be visited with

1 Ballie's Letters and Journals, i. 271.

The Lords' Journals, Dec. 10, 14, 1640, shew the sensitiveness of the House upon what concerned the honour of the Scots and the English lords, who favoured them, and in reference to all which indicated popish sympathies.

2 The first night they tarried at lodgings, "in the Common Garden."

Baillie adds: "The city is desirous we should lodge with them, so tomorrow I think we must flit."

3 Hallam says: (Const. Hist.,i. 527) The petition was prepared "at the instigation of the Scotch Commissioners." Ballie's letters do not support this statement. The Scots, however, were very early in the field against Laud. Lords' Journals, January 2, 1641.

a præmunire for its illegal canons; and preachers have further opportunity of preparing the people to root out Episcopacy. "Huge things," Baillie told his friends, were working in England. God's mighty hand was raising a joyful harvest from long sown tears, but the fruit was scarcely ripe.

The tide of excitement could not be stayed. The London petitioners had not more desire, but they had less patience than the prudent ministers. On the 11th of December, as Baillie tells us, the honest citizens, in their best apparel and in a very modest way, went to the House of Commons, and sent in two aldermen with the document, bearing 15,000 signatures. It was well received. They who brought it were desired to go in peace, and Alderman Pennington laid the huge scroll upon the table.

Another petition, prepared at the same time,1 came under Baillie's notice, who speaks of it as drawn up by the well-affected clergy for the overthrow of the bishops, and posted through the land for signatures, and as likely to be returned in a fortnight, with "a large remonstrance." "At that time," he exultingly adds, "the root of Episcopacy will be assaulted with the strongest blast it ever felt in England. Let your hearty prayers be joined with mine, and of many millions, that the breath of the Lord's nostrils may join with the endeavours of weak men to blow up that old gourd 2 wicked oak." Whether the Presbyterian Commissioner had been misinformed respecting the Petition and Remonstrance, or whether the paper had undergone alterations after its first issue,

1 "At London we met with many ministers from most parts of the kingdom; and upon some meetings and debates, it was resolved that a committee should be chosen to draw up a remonstrance of our grievances,

and to petition the Parliament for reformation, which was accordingly done."-Clark's Lives, page 8.

2 Cross-grained, twisted. Baillie's Letters, &c., i. 286.

this is certain, that when presented to the House on the 23rd January, it differed materially from that of "the Root and Branch," inasmuch as it prayed not for the subversion, but only for the reform of Episcopacy. It contained the names of seven hundred beneficed clergymen. Other petitions had been brought to the House. On the 12th of January several arrived, and that from Kent may be taken as a sample, in which the government of the Church of England by Archbishops, Bishops, Deans, and Archdeacons, was deplored as dangerous to the Commonwealth, and it was earnestly prayed that this hierarchial power might be totally abrogated, if the wisdom of the House should find it could not be maintained by God's word, and to His glory.1

Petitions afterwards flowed in on the other side from Wales, Lancashire, Staffordshire, and other counties.2 High Churchmen talked about the way in which the Puritans and Presbyterians got up these documents. The signatures were fictitious. People were cajoled into writing their names-intended for one purpose, they were perverted for another. Such things might not be altogether without truth. But we are safe in believing, if tricks were played by one party they were played by the other also; and as at present, so then, whatever was done by either faction came in for an unmerciful, and often unrighteous, share of criticism from exasperated opponents. 3

1 Rushworth, iv. 135.

2 The Somersetshire churchmen expressed themselves in moderate terms. - Hallam's Const. Hist., i. 527.

From Cheshire came two petitions, one signed by Episcopalians, the other by Puritans, calling prelates "mighty enemies and secret

underminers" of the church and commonwealth.-Nonconformity in Cheshire. Introduction, xiv.

3 Amongst the petitions of that period was one by Master William Castell, parson of Courtenhall, in the county of Northampton: "for the propagating of the gospel in America and the West Indies."

While petitioners were busy, and the House of Commons had enough to do to hear their grievances, and debates were earnest, and two potent principles were embodied in the strife, the King watched it all with alarm for Episcopacy rather than with any apprehensions for his own personal safety. For his subjects were loyal and dutiful, and, according to Baillie, "feared his frown." He summoned both Houses of Parliament to Whitehall, on the 25th January, 1641, and, after professing willingness to concur in the reformation of the Church, added the following characteristic sentences: "I will show you some rubs, and must needs take notice of some very strange (I know not what term to give them) petitions given in the names of divers counties, against the present established Government, and of the great threatenings against the bishops, that they will make them to be but cyphers, or, at least, their voices to be taken away. Now I must tell you, that I make a great difference between reformation and alteration of Government, though I am for the former, I cannot give way to the latter. If some of them have overstretched their power, I shall not be unwilling these things should be redressed and reformed-nay, further, if upon serious debate you shall show me that bishops

While condemning the proceedings of Spaniards, and lamenting the indifference of English, Scotch, French, and Dutch, the petition expresses the desire of the petitioners, "to enlarge greatly the pale of the Church;" to make the synagogues of Satan temples of the Holy Ghost; "and millions of those silly, seduced Americans, to hear, understand, and practise the mystery of godliness.”

A large number of names are appen

The

ded, approving the petition. learned Edmund Castell, Robert Sanderson(afterwards Bishop of Lincoln), Joseph Caryl, and Edmund Calamy, appear in the list, and it is added that the petition had the approbation of Master Alexander Henderson, and some worthy ministers of Scotland. The union of such different men in this missionary endeavour is worthy of notice.-Anderson's History of the Colonial Church, ii. 11.

have some temporal authority inconvenient to the State, I shall not be unwilling to desire them to lay it down. But this must not be understood, that I shall in any way consent that their voices in Parliament should be taken away; for in all the times of my predecessors since the Conquest, and before, they have enjoyed it, and I am bound to maintain them in it as one of the fundamental constitutions of this kingdom." 1

After petitions from the people, consultations with the Scotch, cautions from the Crown, and preparatory proceedings in the House, the grand debate came on respecting the "Root and Branch" Petition. The debate lasted throughout the 8th and 9th of February, 1641. In the course of it, the mercurial royalist, Lord Digby, observed, he had reason to believe that some aimed at a total extirpation of Episcopacy, yet, whilst opposing such extreme views, he was for clipping the wings of the prelates; and, though condemning the Petition, he thought no people had ever been more provoked than England of late years, by the insolence and exorbitance of the bishops. "For my part," declared he, "I profess I am inflamed with the sense of them, so that I find myself ready to cry out with the loudest of the 15,000, "down with them, down with them, even to the ground! Let us not, however," he added, "destroy bishops, but make bishops such as they were in primitive times." The independent Nathaniel Fiennes opposed Episcopal rule, maintaining that until the Church Government of the country could "be framed of another twist," and more assimilated to that of the commonwealth, the ecclesiastical would be no good neighbour to

1 Abridged from Rushworth, iv. 155.-Baillie says that, as to the part about the bishops, there "was

no hum; and no applause as to the rest."-Letters, i. 292.