ling the pope antichrist, the church of Rome no true church, and every thing tending to expose images in churches, crucifixes, penance, auricular confession, and popish absolution, must be expunged. Sir Edward Drering compares the licensers of the press to the managers of the index expergatorius among the papists, "who clip the tongues of such witnesses whose evidences they do not like; in like manner (says he) our licensers suppress the 'truth, while popish pamphlets fly abroad cum privilegio; 6 nay, they are so bold as to deface the most learned labors of our ancient and best divines. But herein the • Roman index is better than ours, that they approve of their own established doctrines; but our innovators alter our settled doctrines, and superinduce points repugnant and contrary. This I do affirm, and can take upon my "self to prove." Terrible were the triumphs of ARBITRARY POWER Over the liberty and property of the subject, in the intervals between this and the succeeding parliament; gentlemen of birth and character, who refused to lend what money the council was pleased to assess them, were taken out of their houses and imprisoned at a great distance from their habitations; among these were Sir Thomas Wentworth, Sir Walter Earle, Sir John Strangeways, Sir Thomas Grantham, Sir Harbottle Grimstone, John Hampden, Esq. and others; some were confined in the Fleet, the Marshalsea, the Gatehouse, and other prisons about London, as Sir John Elliot, Mr. Selden, &c. gen Upon the whole, there were imprisoned by order of council, nineteen knights, thirteen esquires, and four tlemen, in the county gaols; three knights, one esquire, and four wealthy citizens in the Fleet, besides great numbers in other places. Those of the lower sort who refused to lend were pressed for the army, or had soldiers quartered upon them, who by their insolent behavior disturbed the peace of families, and committed frequent felonies, burglaries, rapines, murders, and other barbarous cruelties, insomuch that the highways were dangerous to travel, and the markets unfrequented. The king would have borrowed one hundred thousand pounds of the city of London, but they excused themselves. However, his majesty got * Rushworth, vol. i. p. 426, 432, 435, 495..! a round sum of money from the papists, by issuing a commission to the archbishop of York, to compound with them for all their forfeitures that had been due for recusaney, since the tenth of King James I. or that should be due hereafter. By this fatal policy, (says the noble historian) men well affected to the hierarchy, though enemies to arbitrary power, were obliged to side with the puritans to save the nation, and enable them to oppose the designs of the court. To convince the people that it was their duty to submit to the loan, the clergy were employed to preach up the doctrines of passive-obedience and non-resistance, and to prove that the absolute submission of subjects to the royal will and pleasure, was the doctrine of holy scripture ;* among those was Dr. Sibthorp, a man of mean parts, but of sordid ambition, who in his sermon at the Lent assizes at Northampton, from Rom. xiii. 7, told the people, "that if princes commanded any thing which subjects might 'not perform, because it is against the laws of God or of nature, or impossible, yet subjects are bound to undergo 'the punishment, without resisting, or railing, or reviling; and so to yield a passive obedience where they cannot 'yield an active one." Dr. Manwaring went further, in two sermons preached before the king at Oatlands, and published under the title of religion and allegiance. He says, "The king is not bound to observe the laws of the 'realm, concerning the subject's rights and liberties, but 'that his royal will and pleasure, in imposing taxes without consent of parliament, doth oblige the subject's con'science on pain of damnation; and that those who refuse 'obedience, transgress the laws of God, insult the king's 'supreme authority, and are guilty of impiety, disloyalty, and rebellion. That the authority of both houses of par'liament is not necessary for the raising aids and subsi'dies, as not suitable to the exigencies of the state." These were the doctrines of the court; "which (says the noble 'historian) were very unfit for the place, and very scanda lous for the persons, who presumed often to determine things out of the verge of their own profession, and in 'ordine ad spiritualia, gave unto Cæsar that which did not belong to him." *Rushworth, p. 426, 440. 196 THE HISTORY CHAP. 3. Sibthorp dedicated his sermon to the king, and carried it to archbishop Abbot to be licensed, which the honest old prelate refused, for which he was suspended from all his archiepiscopal functions, and ordered to retire to Canterbury or Ford, a moorish unhealthy place, five miles beyond Canterbury. The sermon was then carried to the bishop of London, who licensed and recommended it as a sermon learnedly and discreetly preached, agreeable to the ancient doctrine of the primitive church, both for faith and good manners, and to the established doctrine of the church of England. Archbishop Abbot had been out of favor for some time, because he would not give up the laws and liberties of his country, nor treat the great duke of Buckingham with that servile submission that he expected.* Heylin says, the king was displeased with him for being too favorable to the puritans, and too remiss in his government; and that for this reason he seized his jurisdiction, and put it into hands more disposed to act with severity. Fuller says,t that a commission was granted to five bishops, whereof Laud was one, to suspend him for casual homicide that he had committed seven years before, and of which he had been cleared by commissioners appointed to examine into the fact in the reign of King James; besides, his grace had a royal dispensation to shelter him from the canons, and had ever since exercised his jurisdiction without interruption, even to the consecrating of Laud himself to a bishopric. But the commission mentions no cause of his suspension, and only takes notice, that the archbishop cannot at present, in his own person, attend the services which are otherwise proper for his connusance and jurisdiction. But why could he not attend them? Because his majesty had commanded him to retire, for refusing to license Sibthorp's sermon. The blame of this severity fell upon Laud, as if, not having patience to wait for the reverend old prelate's death, he was desirous to step into the archiepiscopal chair while he was alive; for no sooner was Abbot suspended, than his jurisdiction was put into the hands of five bishops by commission, of whom Laud was the chief. • Rushworth, vol. i. p. 61, 435. Collyer, p. 742. There was another prelate that gave the court some uneasiness, (viz.) Dr. Williams bishop of Lincoln, late lordkeeper of the great seal, who being in disgrace retired to his diocese, and became very popular among his clergy.* He declared against the loan, and fell in with the puritans and country party, insomuch that Sir John Lamb and Dr. Sibthorp informed the council that they were grieved to see the bishop of Lincoln give place to unconformable ministers, when he turned his back upon those who were conformable; that the puritans ruled all with him; and that divers of them in Leicestershire being convened before the commissaries, his lordship would not admit proceedings to be had against them. That they [the commissaries for the biga commission] had nformed the bishop, then at Bugden, of several of the factious puritans in his diocese who would not come up to the table to receive the communion kneeling; of their keeping unlawful fasts and meetings; that one fast held from eight in the morning till nine at night; and that collections for money were made without authority, upon pretence for the Palatinate: that therefore they had desired leave from the bishop to proceed against them ex of ficio; but the bishop replied, that he would not meddle against the puritans, that for his part he expected not another bishopric: they might complain of them if they would to the council-table, for he was under a cloud already. He had the duke of Buckingham for his enemy, and therefore would not draw the puritans upon him, for he was sure they would carry all things at last. Besides, he said, the king, in the first year of his reign, had given answer to a petition of the lower house at Oxford in favor of the puritans. It appeared by the information of others, that Lamb and Sibthorp pressed the bishop again to proceed against the puritans in Leicestershire; that the bishop then asked them, what sort of people they were, and of what condition? To which Sir John Lamb replied, in the presence of Dr. Sibthorp, "that they seemed to the world to be such as would 'not swear, whore, nor be drunk, but yet they would lie, 'cozen, and deceive; that they would frequently hear two ́ sermons a day, and repeat the same again too, and after Rushworth, vol. i. p. 424-5. 'wards pray, and that sometimes they would fast all day long." Then the bishop asked whether the places where those puritans were, did lend money freely upon the collection for the loan? To which Sir John Lamb and Dr. Sibthorp replied that they did. Then said the bishop, no man of discretion can say, that that place is a place of puritans: for my part (said the bishop) I am not satisfied to give way to proceedings against them; at which Sibthorp was much discontented, and said he was troubled to see that the church was no better regarded. This information being transmitted to the council, was sealed up for the present, but was afterwards, with some other matters, produced against his lordship in the star-chamber, as will be seen hereafter. Though the king was at war with Spain, and with the house of Austria, and (if I may be allowed to say it) with his own subjects; though he had no money in his Exchequer, and was at the greatest loss how to raise any; yet he suffered himself to be prevailed with to enter into a new war with France, under the color of maintaining the protestant religion in that country, without so much as thinking of ways and means to support it. But when one considers the character of this king and his ministry, it is hard to believe that this could be the real motive of the war; for his majesty and the whole court had a mortal aversion to the French hugonots.* Buckingham had no religion at all; Weston and Conway were catholics; Laud and Neile thought there was no salvation for protestants out of the church of England; how then can it be supposed that they should make war in defence of a religion for which they had the utmost contempt? Lord Clarendon says, the war was owing to Buckingham's disappointment in his amours at the French court; but it is more likely he advised it to keep up the misunderstandings between the king and his parliaments, by continuing the necessity of raising money by extraordinary methods, upon which his credit and reputation depended. War being declared, the queen's domestics were sent home, and a fleet was fitted out, which made a fruitless descent upon the isle of Rhee, under the conduct of the duke of † Vol. i. p. 38-9. * Rapin, vol. ii. p. 260, folio edit. |