tution, and to revive the dying laws of their A.D. 1640. country. It is as certain that the composure on which Lord Clarendon expatiates, was a silent, gloomy submission to the arbitrary power of the court, a power which few individuals could venture to withstand. parliament. The king had no better success in his war Meeting of against the Scotch than he had in those against France and Spain. He found it necessary to raise another army; he was in the greatest distress for money, and the revenue of the crown was antici in a private house till the parliament met in November 1640.25-Rushworth. At a tavern in Chancerylane, some young gentlemen of Lincoln's Inn were drinking a toast, which a drawer who attended them informed the archbishop was to his confusion; whereupon his grace procured a warrant to a messenger to bring them before the council. A little before the time of their appearance, they applied themselves to the Earl of Dorset to stand their friend; and acknowledged their unadvisedness in drinking a rash toast. The earl asked who was the witness against them; they answered, one of the drawers: "where did he stand," said the earl, "when he heard you drink the toast?" they replied, at the door going out of the room. "Tush," said he, "the drawer was mistaken; you drank to the confusion of the archbishop's foes, and he heard only the first part of the words." This hinted to the gentlemen a proper excuse, which they did not think of before. Lord Dorset, however, advised them to carry themselves with all humility and respect when they were called in before the king and council. They followed his advice, and by this means, and the favour of Lord Dorset and others, received only a reproof, and so were dismissed. A.D.1640. pated. These exigences at last obliged him to Pernicious call a new parliament; though "those meetings," Lord Clarendon says, "had been of late attended with some disorders, the effect of mutinous spirits." The parliament met April 13, 1640, in a disposition, and with a resolution, to set forth and redress the numerous public grievances that existed both in church and state. Petitions ↑ were presented from several counties by the knights of shires, complaining of ship-money, projects, monopolies, the star-chamber, high commission courts, and other oppressions. Not one of the members offered to deny or justify these things. The sense of the house concurred with the petitioners. The members seemed determined to make a thorough inquiry into the national evils, with regard to the liberty and property of the subject, the privileges of parliament, and innovations in matters of religion. The doctrines of bishops, at the very beginning of this reign, the clergy. * These were Mr. Hollis, Sir themselves in defence of the + Arthur Capel, afterwards Lord Capel, was the first who presented a petition, which was from the county of Hertford; and Mr. Grimston opened the debates upon the petitions. -Rushworth. ↑ Mr. Locke. denied that they held their jurisdiction from the 1st. That the king might constitute laws, when, where, and against whom he pleased. 2dly. That parliaments serve kings as men do apes, a bit and a blow; give him a subsidy, and take away two or three of his prerogatives. 3dly. That ministers silenced for not reading the book of recreation, and the king's declaration, are advanced, and these calves are worshipped even from Dan to Beersheba. 4thly. That tonnage and poundage are the king's as absolutely as his crown, defend he the A.D. 1640. A.D. 1640. seas or not; so are also our goods, ourselves, our wives and children, and he may call for his own when he will. 5thly. That the king can of himself make laws to bind the conscience. Doctrines like these had before been publicly avowed by Sibthorpe, Manwaring, and others. Manwaring, in particular, in a sermon preached before the king soon after his coming to the crown, and which was afterwards published, maintained, "That the king's royal will and pleasure in imposing laws and taxes, without the consent of parliament, did oblige the subject's conscience upon pain of eternal damnation; and that the authority of parliament was not necessary for raising aids and subsidies." Lord Clarendon mentions, in a very slight and cursory manner, these doctrines, and the clamours occasioned by them. He says, "The indiscretion and folly of one sermon at Whitehall was more bruited abroad, and commented upon, than the wisdom, sobriety, and devotion of an hundred;" which he imputes, as he does all the distraction of those times, to the perverseness of the people, "who wanted a sense, acknowledgment, and value of their own happiness." The true reason, however, why these doctrines were so generally exclaimed against, was A.D. 1640. because they were patronised by the court, which punished* those who opposed them, and rewarded† such as maintained them. Add to this, that they co-operated with the many courts of oppression in supporting an absolute power, confirmed the king in his arbitrary maxims, and probably had suggested many of them to him. To these doctrines, therefore, and the authors of them, if we * Archbishop Abbot refused to license a sermon of Dr. Sibthorpe's, intitled Apostolical Obedience, preached before the judges at Northampton; in which he had asserted the king's power of raising money by his own authority. The king pressed the archbishop, by several messages, to license the sermon, and sent him word, "that if he did not despatch it, he would take another course with him." The archbishop persisting in his refusal, was sequestered from his office. A commission was granted to Bishop Laud, and four other bishops, to execute the archiepiscopal jurisdiction, and the archbishop died during the sequestration. ↑ Dr. Manwaring, upon an accusation sent up by the |