[88] Mr. Bruce's interesting introduction to the volume of Proceedings, &c., in connection with the Committee of Religion appointed in 1640, (printed by the Camden Society,) gives a minute history of the baronet's love adventures.

[89] It is stated on the authority of a letter in the possession of the Trevor family, that, "to escape detection the oppositionists resorted to the place of rendezvous with disguised faces." Johnson's Life of Selden, 30.

[90] Clarendon's Hist., p. 69.

[91] The appointment of a Committee of Religion was debated and delayed in the first Parliament of this reign; One was appointed immediately after the assembling of the second—and also on the meeting of the third.—See Journals, June 25, 1625; Feb. 7, 10, 12, 1625-6; March 20, 1627-8.

[92] The sentence on Leighton is given by Rushworth, ii. 56.

Neal, ii., 218, follows Rushworth and states the particulars of Leighton's punishment as being recorded in Laud's Diary. But in the Diary, 4th November, Works iii. 212, there is nothing beyond a reference to Leighton's degradation in the High Commission Court. Neal adds that Laud pulled off his cap, and thanked God for the sentence.

For this anecdote, authority may be found in a curious book, by Leighton, entitled An Epitome of the great troubles he has suffered. In the course of his narration, after defending himself against the charge of being a Conventicle keeper, a libeller, a schismatic, a traitor, and a factious person, he says, in relation to his trial.—"The censure was to cut my ears, slit my nose, to brand me in the face, to whip me at a post, to stand on the pillory, ten thousand pounds fine, and perpetual imprisonment; and all these upon a dying man, by appearance

—instant morientibus ursæ.

The censure thus past, the prelate off with his cap, and holding up his hands, gave thanks to God, who had given him the victory over his enemies."—pp. 69, 70.

"I being put thereafter on the pillory an hour and a half, in frost and snow, they inflicted the rest, and would not let me have a coach of my own to carry me to the Fleet; but I was forced to be carried by water, for I was not able to go. I lay ten weeks under the canopy of heaven, in the dirt and mire of the rubbish, having nothing to shelter me from the rain and snow, in a very cold season."—p. 85.

In connection with Leighton's statement, the following passage from the Rawlinson MS. is worthy of notice:—"In the Court of High Commission, 19 April, 1632, the King's Advocate against Joseph Harrison, Clerk, Vicar of Sustorke, 'the sentence was presently read by the Archbishop of Canterbury, In Dei nomine, Amen, &c., &c., Deum præ oculis preponentes, &c.,' at which words I marked some of the Bishops to look upward, and put off their hats devoutly." From this passage it would appear to have been a practice in the Court, when sentence was passed, to pronounce it in the name of God, and for the Commissioners to take off their hats in token of reverence when these sacred words were uttered. The question arises, did Leighton mistake what was a customary act for a special expression of Laud's feeling in this particular case? or, did Laud really go out of his way to indicate his gratification at the sufferings of Leighton? I must leave the reader to judge for himself, who, however, ought to bear in mind Laud's character. Leighton gives the following account of his sufferings:—

"The aforesaid censure was executed in every particular in a most cruel manner and measure: the executioner was made drunk in the Fleet the night before, and also was hardened the very same day with very strong water, being threatened to do it with all rigour: and so he did, by knife, whip, brand, and fire, insomuch that never a lash he gave with a treble cord, but he brought away the flesh, which I shall feel to my dying day."

[93] Yet, looking at the persecution which the Puritans suffered, the same plea will avail for them that has been urged on behalf of the early Protestants. "It was, as they thought, like exhorting a Caligula and a Nero to clemency, and advising the poor subjects to compliment such tyrants, to remind them gently of their defects, and humbly to entreat that they would be so good and gracious as to condescend to alter their conduct."—Jortin's Life of Erasmus, i. 212.

From a Biographical Narration, by Burton, it appears he had been Clerk of the Closet to Prince Henry and to Prince Charles. The narration contains many curious particulars. There is an important letter about Burton, by Bishop Hall, in Forster's Life of Eliot, ii. 428.

[94] Hanbury's Historical Memorials, ii., 52.

[95] Rushworth, iv. 207.

[96] Forster's Life of Eliot, ii. 84, 562.

[97] Forster's Life of Pym, 96.

[98] It was a charge against Burton that he carried the sacred elements to the communicants on their seats.—Dow's Innovations, 186. Lathbury's History of Convocation, 261.

[99] Forster's Life of Pym, 99.

[100] Rushworth, iv. 24.

[101] Quoted in Sanford's Illustrations, 310.

[102] Clarendon, 69. Sanford's Illustrations, 310.

[103] Clarendon says Strafford did not come to the House at all that day till after his impeachment. I attach little importance to Clarendon's statements, when inconsistent with what is said by so accurate a man as D'Ewes. From his journal it appears that Strafford did go to the House in the morning. Sanford's Illustrations, 310.

[104] D'Ewes Journal, Sanford's Studies and Illustrations, 312.

[105] Baillie's Letters and Journals, published by the Bannatyne Club, 4to, i. 272. Other minute particulars are taken from the same source.

[106] See his Journal, 1640, Dec. 18. Works, iii. 238.

[107] Burgess and Marshall preached on the occasion from Jeremiah l. 5, and 2. Chron. xv. 2. The sermons were published, and may be found in the library of the British Museum. They relate to covenanting with God, but I do not see that the preachers make any reference to the Scotch covenant, though Nalson charges them with having had their eye on that symbol all the way through.—Collection, i. 530.

[108] November 20. See Commons' Journal.

[109] See Journals, February 9, 1625-6, and March 10, 1627-8.

[110] It is so regarded by Neal and those who follow him.—History of Puritans, ii. 362.

[111] History of England, ii. 653.

[112] Journals, November 20. A collection was made after the communion, amounting to £78. 16. 2.—Nalson's Collections, 1. 700.

[113] Memorials of English Affairs, Whitelocke, 38. Journal of Commons, Nov. 25, 1640, and pamphlets of the period.

[114] The minister complained of was John Squire, of whom Walker gives an account in his Sufferings of the Clergy, Part i. 68.—These illustrations are gathered from Diurnals and other Tracts in the Library of the Brit. Museum.

[115] Speech of Mr. Rouse in Rushworth, iv. 211. See also Speeches of Sir Ed. Dering and Sir John Wray.

[116] These particulars, and many more, are found in A Certificate from Northamptonshire, 1641. Brit. Mus. The "great scarcity of preaching ministers" was early noticed, and a sub-committee appointed to consider it.—See Journals, 19th December, 1640. Extracts from the Register of the Archbishop of Canterbury, shew that the number of benefices in England was 8,803, whereof 3,277 were impropriations, and that the number of livings under £10 was 4,543; under £40, 8,659; and that only the remainder, being 144, were of the value of £40 and upwards.—Cal. Dom. 1634-5, p. 381.

[117] Lathbury's Hist. of Con., 246.

[118] Nalson, i. 545.

[119] This oath "approved the doctrine and discipline of government established in the Church of England, as containing all things necessary to salvation;" and denied all "consent to alter the government of this Church by Archbishops, Bishops, Deans, Archdeacons, &c., as it stands now established."

[120] Journals of the Commons, Dec. 16, 1640.—The matter came before the House again on the 7th June, 1641.

[121] The letter is in Laud's Works, Vol. vi. 584.

[122] Laud's Works, vi. 589.

[123] Lathbury's Hist. of Convocation, 267.

[124] See Letter to Bullinger by Sandys, 1573.—Zurich Letters, 294.

[125] Fuller, ii. 504-5.

[126] It frequently appears in the records of that period. There is a curious example in the introduction to the will of Humphrey Fen.—Cal. Dom., 1633-4, p. 468.

[127] They claimed as precedents the Protestants in Queen Mary's time, and the exiles at Geneva, that used a book framed by them there.—Strype's Parker, i. 480.

There is at Horningsham, in Wiltshire, an old meeting-house, with a large stone in the end wall, bearing date 1566. When the stone was put there is not known, and whence it came I cannot learn, but the Rev. H. M. Gunn, of Warminster, informs me that, according to tradition, some Scotch Presbyterians, disciples of Knox, came over from Scotland to build Longleat House for Sir John Thynne, in 1566. The building went on for thirteen years, when Sir John died. They refused to attend the parish church, and obtained a cottage in which to meet for Divine service, with a piece of land attached for a grave-yard. This house, Mr. Gunn says, turned into a chapel, has been preserved till now. Though originally a Presbyterian, it long since became an Independent place of worship.

[128] Afterwards Mrs. Hazzard.

[129] Records of the Baptist Church, Broadmead, Bristol, 10-18. See also Cal. Dom., 1634-5, p. 416, for arguments by Dr. Stoughton, on the duty of separation.

As women were active in promoting Puritanism, so they had been a century before in promoting Protestantism.—See numerous examples in Foxe's Book of Martyrs.

[130] Dugdale's Troubles in England, 36, 62, 65.

Wood's Athenæ Oxonienses, ii. 347.

[131] Parl. Hist., ii. 674.

[132] Bagshawe's own account, in Hanbury's Memorials, ii. 141.

[133] See Cal. Dom., 1633-4, p. 33 et seq.; also Preface, viii.

[134] Baillie's Letters and Journals, vol. i. 211-214.

[135] Baillie'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.

[136] The first night they tarried at lodgings, "in the Common Garden." Baillie adds: "The city is desirous we should lodge with them, so to-morrow I think we must flit."

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

[138] "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.

[139] Cross-grained, twisted. Baillie's Letters, &c., i. 286.

[140] Rushworth, iv. 135.

[141] 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.

[142] 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 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 appended, approving the petition. The 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.

[143] 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.

[144] No traces of Pym's speech are found in Rushworth, Nalson, or Parliamentary Debates. It is not mentioned in Forster's Life of the Great Statesmen, or in Sanford's Illustrations. The extract I have given is from A Just Vindication of the questioned part of the reading of Edward Bagshawe, Esq., 1660, p. 2-4. The tract states that Pym's speech was delivered when the petition was read and debated in the House. Hanbury's Memorials, ii. 141.

[145] Rushworth, iv. 170-187.

[146] 9th Feb., 1641.

[147] Quoted in Studies and Illustrations, by Sanford, 319.

[148] Mr. Godwin, in his History of the Commonwealth, i. 58, interprets the resolution as meaning "we are not yet decided to maintain Episcopacy." The debate, and even the words themselves, seem to me inconsistent with that view.

[149] These particulars are taken from the Journal of Sir Ralph Verney, a member of the Committee. Lord Nugent, in his Life of Hampden, gives some account of this MS.; but Mr. Bruce has published the entire notes in a volume of the Camden Society, with many valuable remarks.

[150] The following extract from the Lords' Journals is an illustration:

"Mr. Etheridge, minister, and Mr. Carter, the curate, and William Till, clerk of the parish, Ben Parsons, Tho. Chadwick, were examined at the bar, concerning the riot lately committed in the church of Halstead, in the county of Essex; as striking the Book of Common Prayer out of the curate's hand as he was baptizing a child at the fount, and kicking it up and down the church, and for taking the clerk by the throat, forcing him to deliver unto them the hood and surplice, which they immediately rent and tore in pieces; and other misdemeanours and outrages were committed in the said church, on Simon and Jude's day last, in divine service, by Jonathan Poole and Grace his wife." 10th December, 1640.

Certain Nonconformists of St. Saviour's parish were complained of to the House for illegally assembling for worship. The House directed they should be left to the ordinary proceedings of justice, according to the course of law. Journals of the Lords, January 16th. See also 19th and 21st.

[151] As the accounts of this committee given by Fuller, Neal, and Cardwell, are incomplete in consequence of the writers having neglected to consult the Journals of the House of Lords, I subjoin the following entries relating to this business:—

10 die Martii, 1640-1.

After an order that the Communion-table in every church remain where it is accustomed to be, it is ordered, "That these lords following are appointed to take into consideration all innovations in the Church concerning religion:—The Lord Treasurer, the Lord Chamberlain, Earls of Bath, South'ton, Bedford, Hartford, Essex, Dorset, Sarum, Warwick, March, Bristol, Clare, Berks, Dover, and Lord Viscount Say and Sele; Bishops of Winton, Chester, Lincoln, Sarum, Exon, Carlile, Ely, Bristol, Rochester, Chichester; and Ds. (Dominus), Strange, Willoughby de Earseby, North, Kymbolton, Howard de Charlton, Grey de Werk, Robarts, Craven, Pawlett, Howard de Escrick, Goringe, Savill, Dunsemore, and Seymor.

"6 die Martii.

"That the Committee for Innovations in Religion do meet on Wednesday next, and the committee to have power to send for such learned men as their lordships shall please, to assist them.

"10 die Martii.

"That the Committee for Religion do meet on Friday next, in the afternoon, and no other committee to sit that afternoon, and their lordships to have power to send for what learned divines their lordships shall please, for their better information: as the Lord Archbishop of Armagh, Dr. Prideaux, Dr. Warde, Dr. Twiste (Twiss) Dr. Hacket, who are to have intimation given them by the Lord Bishop of Lincoln to attend the Lords' Committees."

The following names, given by Fuller, Collier, and Neal must be taken as a list of the sub-committee. Williams, Bishop of Lincoln; Ussher, Archbishop of Armagh; Morton, Bishop of Durham; and Hall, Bishop of Exeter; Drs. Ward, Prideaux, Twiss, Sanderson, Featley, Brownrigg, Holdsworth, Hacket, Burgess, White, Marshall, Calamy, and Hill. Morton of Durham does not appear on the list of the Lords' Committee. Cardwell places in the list the name of Montague, but I find it mentioned by no one else. He is not a likely person to have had anything to do with the Committee, and he is probably confounded by Cardwell with Hall, who succeeded him in the bishopric of Norwich, being translated, on Montague's death, to that see from Exeter.

[152] Quoted in Campbell's Lives of the Chancellors, iii. 187.

[153] Hacket's Memorial of Williams, Part ii. 147.

Sir N. Brent, in a paper dated September 9, 1634, gives an account of his "metropolitical visitation" of Williams's diocese. He describes the Communion-table at Lincoln as not decent, and the rail worse; organs old and nought; copes and vestments embezzled; ale-houses, hounds, and swine kept in the churchyard; Hitchin church and churchyard out of order; curate of Stowe accustomed "to marry people with gloves and masks on."—Cal. Dom. In another paper, probably pertaining to 1634, Boston seeks to free itself from the suspicions of Puritanism by saying that there were 2,000 communicants at church, who, for want of room to kneel, were compelled to receive the Lord's Supper standing.—Ibid. p. 422.

[154] Fuller's Church History, iii. 415.

[155] Laud's Works, iii. 241.

[156] The following letter (without signature) illustrates this point: "A new Committee for Religion was appointed to have sat on Monday in the afternoon last, but there being neither meeting nor adjournment, it was left sine die: yet, on Thursday in the afternoon, the Bishops of Lincoln, Durham, Winchester, and Bristol met, where the assistants, attended by some threescore other divines of inferior rank, were present, and many temporal Lords; and many points of doctrine and Church service being questioned, among the rest one Lord said, that it ought to be put out of the creed 'that Christ descended into Hell,' which he did not believe. Yesterday in the forenoon, without any intimation or notice given to the other committees, the same spiritual Lords and divines met at the Bishop of Lincoln's lodging, where, in less than two hours, they condemned, (as I am informed by the Bishop of Bristol, present), about fifty points in doctrine, what they had met with in several treatises and sermons of late printed amongst us. They had culled out a passage of my Lord of Canterbury in his Star Chamber speech, which they say is, that Hoc est corpus meum, is more than Hoc est verbum meum: which the Bishop of Lincoln censured, for that verbum did make corpus; but would not further hear, because his grace was likely to answer it shortly elsewhere."—April 10, 1641. State Papers, Chas. I. Dom.

[157] I say almost, because the practice of sitting, while singing hymns, which was common in Nonconforming places of worship when I was young, may still linger in some quarters.

[158] The following query appears respecting marriage:—

"Whether none hereafter shall have licences to marry, nor be asked their banns of matrimony, that shall not bring with them a certificate from their Minister that they are instructed in their Catechism."

[159] The specified alterations are: "I give thee power over my body;" "knowing assuredly that the dead shall rise again;" and "I pronounce thee absolved;" instead of the well-known forms so often objected to.

I have gone fully into an account of what was proposed to this Committee, not only because it may have a particular interest for those who are active in promoting a revision of the Prayer Book, but because there are such diversified statements in relation to the subject in our historians. Compare Fuller, Collier, and Neal. Neal presents his condensation of the papers with inverted commas, as if placing before the reader the original documents. (In other cases, too, he gives his own abridgment in this fashion, so as to mislead the student.) An entire copy of the proceedings of the Committee may be found in Cardwell's Conferences, p. 270, taken from Baxter's Life and Times, Part i. 369.

[160] Neal, ii. 465.

[161] See Journals for March 9th, 10th, 11th, and 22nd. May says, "Doctors and parsons of parishes were made everywhere Justices of Peace, to the great grievance of the country, in civil affairs, and depriving them of their spiritual edification."—Hist. of Long Parliament, 24.

[162] Rushworth, iv. 206. This Bill was under discussion in the Lords, in October, 1641.—Nalson, ii. 496.

[163] Journals.

[164] Clarendon's Hist., 94.

[165] July 1.—"The Lords, upon the reasons offered by the Commons, were satisfied to consent to pass the Bill to take away the High Commission Court both here and at York, but argued to have the Star Chamber Court not quite taken away, but bounded, limited, and reduced to what power it had in Henry VII's time."—Rushworth, iv. 304. Both Bills received the royal assent, July 5.

[166] The writers were: Stephen Marshall, Edmund Calamy, Thos. Young, Matt. Newcomen, and Wm. Spurstow.

[167] The Reduction of Episcopacy, which bears Ussher's name, was not published till after his death, in 1656. Baxter says in reference to it, "I asked him (Dr. Ussher) whether the paper be his that is called, A reduction of Episcopacy to the form of Synodical Government; which he owned, and Dr. Bernard after witnessed to be his."—Life and Times, part ii. 206.

I may here observe that the Archbishop, according to his biographer, Elrington, appears always to have spelt his name with a double s.

[168] Baillie, i. 351.

[169] May 3, 1641. Parl. Hist., ii. 776.

I have here and elsewhere, in giving the substance of speeches, adhered to the quaint phraseology employed by the speakers.

[170] For the protestation, see Parl. Hist., ii. 777. Alterations were made which throw light on the fears of returning popery.—Verney's Notes, published by the Camden Society, 67-70.

[171] Instances of the taking of it are numerous. In the Register Book of Wansted it is found with the names of the principal inhabitants.—Lyson's Environs of London, iv. 243.

Whitaker, in his History of Richmondshire, mentions an endorsement on the Return Roll for the parishes and townships of Bentham, Ingleton, Thornton, Sedberg, Dent, and Garsdale:—"The names of those persons who refused to make protestation within Garsdale parcell of the township of Dent, viz: George Heber Gent, Abraham Nelson, chapman, who publiquely refused before the whole Dale in the Church."—vol. ii. 363.

[172] See Journals of the Commons, May 12th.

[173] August 2nd. Parl. Hist. ii, 895. Compare Nalson, ii. 414-417.

[174] Baillie, i. 351. He refers here to the Commons.

[175] Hallam's Const. Hist., i. 524. The sagacious author justly remarks—"And thus we trace again the calamities of Charles to their two great sources; his want of judgment in affairs, and of good faith towards his people." The Lords passed the Bill on the 8th; the royal assent was given on the 10th.

[176] Parl. Hist., ii. 778.

[177] Parl. Hist., ii. 783. May 5. D'Ewes gives another amusing version of the story, (under date May 19).—Sanford's Illustrations, 373. Baillie's account is somewhat different.

[178] Maitland's London, i. 338.

[179] The bitter Presbyterian feeling against Strafford is plain enough in Baillie's letters.

It belongs not to the scope of this ecclesiastical History to enter on the details of the trial, but I cannot resist the temptation to insert in the Appendix two letters found in the State Paper Office, giving an account of the way in which the bill of attainder was introduced.

[180] See Speeches by Lane and St. John (Rushworth's Trial of Strafford, 671, et seq.); then read what follows:

"It certainly does astonish us that men, however they may have condemned the conduct of Strafford, could bring themselves to believe that he was guilty of the crime of high treason; for they could hardly have been deceived by the wicked sophistry of St. John that an attempt to subvert the fundamental laws of the kingdom was high treason at common law, and still remains so, or by the base opinion delivered by the judges—that this amounts to high treason under the Statute of Edward III."—Campbell's Lives of the Chancellors, iv. 15.

[181] Ussher of Armagh, Juxon of London, Morton of Durham, Potter of Carlisle, and Williams of Lincoln.

[182] Slightly abridged from Elrington's Life of Ussher, 213.

[183] That such a distinction was suggested seems generally admitted. Clarendon attributes it to Williams, (Rebellion, 140.) This, considering the historian's prejudice respecting the Archbishop, is not perfectly conclusive against Williams, any more than the silence of Hacket (Life of Williams, pt. II., i. 161,)—who only speaks of the advice given in common, founded on the distinction between facts and law—is conclusively in his favour.

Clarendon is corroborated by the circumstance, that Ussher and Juxon were freed from the charge by the King himself (according to the report of Sir Edward Walker), and of the remaining prelates Williams was the most likely to give such advice as Clarendon mentions.

[184] Fuller's Church History, iii. 421.

The author says he copied what he gives of Hacket's speech out of his own papers. Nalson's Report (ii. 240) seems to be an amplification of what is contained in Rushworth, iv. 269. Verney entirely agrees with Fuller (Verney Papers—Camden Society, 75), but only in a few particulars with Nalson. Nalson is also wrong in saying Hacket answered Burgess. Hacket spoke first. Burgess answered him.