of style. Indeed, the cumbrous and inelegant structure of the sentences brought on Sancroft some raillery, which he bore with less patience than he showed under much heavier trials. But in substance nothing could be more skilfully framed than this memorable document. All disloyalty, all intolerance, was earnestly disclaimed. The king was assured that the Church was still, as she had ever been, faithful to the throne. He was assured also that the bishops would, in proper place and time, as Lords of Parliament and members of the Upper House of Convocation, show that they by no means wanted tenderness for the conscientious scruples of Dissenters. But Parliament had, both in the late and in the present reign, pronounced that the sovereign was not constitutionally competent to dispense with statutes in matters ecclesiastical. The Declaration was therefore illegal; and the petitioners could not, in prudence, honor, or conscience, be parties to the solemn publishing of an illegal Declaration in the house of God, and during the time of divine service.

This paper was signed by the Archbishop and by six of his suffragans, Lloyd of Saint Asaph, Turner of Ely, Lake of Chichester, Ken of Bath and Wells, White of Peterborough, and Trelawney of Bristol. The Bishop of London, being under suspension, did not. sign.

It was now late on Friday evening; and on Sunday morning the Declaration was to be read in the churches of London. It was necessary to put the paper into the king's hands without delay. The six bishops crossed the river to Whitehall. The Archbishop, who had long been forbidden the court, did not accompany them. Lloyd, leaving his five brethren at the house of Lord Dartmouth in the vicinity of the palace, went to Sunderland, and begged that minister to read the petition, and to ascertain when the king would be willing to receive it. Sunderland, afraid of compromising himself, refused to look at the paper, but went immediately to the royal closet. James directed that the bishops should be admitted. He had heard from his tool Cartwright that they were disposed to obey the royal mandate, but that they wished for some little modifications in form, and that they meant to present a humble request to that effect. His majesty was therefore in a very good humor. When they knelt before him, he graciously told them to rise, took the paper from Lloyd, and said, "This is my Lord of Canterbury's hand." "Yes, sir, his own hand," was the answer. James read the petition; he folded it up, and his countenance grew dark. "This," he said, "is a great surprise to me. I did

not expect this from your Church, especially from some of you. This is a standard of rebellion."

The bishops broke out into passionate professions of loyalty; but the king, as usual, repeated the same words over and over. "I tell you this is a standard of rebellion." "Rebellion!" cried Trelawney, falling on his knees. "For God's sake, sir, do not say so hard a thing of us. No Trelawney can be a rebel. Remember that my family has fought for the crown. Remember how I served your majesty when Monmouth was in the West." "We put down the last rebellion," said Lake: "we shall not raise another." "We rebel!" exclaimed Turner; "we are ready to die at your Majesty's feet." "Sir," said Ken, in a more manly tone, "I hope that you will grant to us that liberty of conscience which you grant to all mankind."

Still James went on. "This is rebellion. This is a standard of rebellion. Did ever a good churchman question the dispensing power before? Have not some of you preached for it and written for it? It is a standard of rebellion. I will have my Declaration published." "We have two duties to perform," answered Ken, 'our duty to God, and our duty to your Majesty. We honor you; but we fear God." "Have I deserved this?" said the king, more and more angry, "I who have been such a friend to your Church? I did not expect this from some of you. I will be obeyed. My Declaration shall be published. You are trumpeters of sedition. What do you do here? Go to your dioceses; and see that I am obeyed. I will keep this paper. I will not part with it, I will remember you that have signed it." "God's will be done," said Ken. "God has given me the dispensing power," said the king, "and I will maintain it. I will tell you that there are still seven thousand of your Church who have not bowed the knee to Baal." The bishops respectfully retired. That very evening the document which they had put into the hands of the king appeared word for word in print, was laid on the tables of all the coffee-houses, and was cried about the streets. Everywhere the people rose from their beds, and came out to stop the hawkers. It was said that the printer cleared a thousand pounds in a few hours by this penny broadside. This is probably an exaggeration; but it is an exaggeration which proves that the sale was enormous. How the petition got abroad is still a mystery.

...

In the City and Liberties of London were about a hundred parish churches. In only four of these was the Order in Council obeyed. At Saint Gregory's the Declaration was read by a divine

of the name of Martin. As soon as he uttered the first words, the whole congregation rose and withdrew. At Saint Matthew's, in Friday Street, a wretch named Timothy Hall, who had disgraced his gown by acting as broker for the Duchess of Portsmouth in the sale of pardons, and who now had hopes of obtaining the vacant bishopric of Oxford, was in like manner left alone in his church. At Sergeant's Inn, in Chancery Lane, the clerk pretended that he had forgotten to bring a copy; and the Chief Justice of the King's Bench, who had attended in order to see that the royal mandate was obeyed, was forced to content himself with this excuse. Samuel Wesley, the father of John and Charles Wesley, a curate in London, took for his text that day the noble answer of the three Jews to the Chaldean tyrant: "Be it known unto thee, O king, that we will not serve thy gods, nor worship the golden image which thou hast set up." Even in the chapel of Saint James's Palace the officiating minister had the courage to disobey the order. The Westminster boys long remembered what took place that day in the Abbey. Sprat, Bishop of Rochester, officiated there as dean. As soon as he began to read the Declaration, murmurs and the noise of people crowding out of the choir drowned his voice. He trembled so violently that men saw the paper shake in his hand. Long before he had finished, the place was deserted by all but those whose situation made it necessary for them to remain. . .

Another week of anxiety and agitation passed away. Sunday came again. Again the churches of the capital were thronged by hundreds of thousands. The Declaration was read nowhere except at the very few places where it had been read the week before. The minister who had officiated at the chapel in Saint James's Palace had been turned out of his situation; a more obsequious divine appeared with the paper in his hand, but his agitation was so great that he could not articulate. In truth, the feeling of the whole nation had now become such as none but the very best and noblest, or the very worst and basest, of mankind could without much discomposure encounter.

BIBLIOGRAPHICAL NOTE TO CHAPTERS VIII AND IX

Traill, William III. Seeley, Growth of British Policy, Vol. II, pp. 250 ff. Lecky, History of England in the Eighteenth Century, Vol. I, chap. i. Ranke, History of England, Vol. IV, 209 ff. Hallam, Constitutional History, Vol. II, chaps. xiv. and xv. The documents are to be found in Robertson, Select Statutes, Cases, and Documents.

CHAPTER IX

THE WHIG REVOLUTION AND SETTLEMENT

WHEN the actions of James II transcended the bounds of national patience, a self-constituted committee of both Whigs and Tories invited William, Prince of Orange, to come over with an armed force to defend what they regarded as their liberties. William, who wanted to draw the country into his continental schemes, accepted the invitation, and in November, 1688, landed in England. Deserted by his supporters, James could not make even a semblance of resistance, and consequently fled to France. In January, 1689, a convention parliament called by William declared that the throne was vacant and offered the crown to him and Mary.

1. Discussion of Constitutional Principles1

It was now known to whom the crown would be given. On what conditions it should be given still remained to be decided. The Commons had appointed a committee to consider what steps it might be advisable to take, in order to secure law and liberty against the aggressions of future sovereigns; and the committee had made a report. This report recommended, first, that those great principles of the constitution which had been violated by the dethroned king should be solemnly asserted; and, secondly, that many new laws should be enacted, for the purpose of curbing the prerogative and purifying the administration of justice. Most of the suggestions of the committee were excellent; but it was utterly impossible that the Houses could, in a month, or even a year, deal properly with matters so numerous, so various, and so important. It was proposed, among other things, that the militia should be remodelled, that the power which the sovereign possessed of proroguing and dissolving Parliaments should be restricted; that the 1Macaulay, History of England, chap. x.

duration of Parliaments should be limited; that the royal pardon should no longer be pleadable to a parliamentary impeachment; that toleration should be granted to Protestant Dissenters; that the crime of high treason should be more precisely defined; that trials for high treason should be conducted in a manner more favorable to innocence; that the judges should hold their places for life; that the mode of appointing sheriffs should be altered; that juries should be nominated in such a way as might exclude partiality and corruption; that the practice of filing criminal informations in the King's Bench should be abolished; that the Court of Chancery should be reformed; that the fees of public functionaries should be regulated; and that the law of quo warranto should be amended. It was evident that cautious and deliberate legislation on these subjects must be the work of more than one laborious session; and it was equally evident that hasty and crude legislation on subjects so grave could not but produce new grievances, worse than those which it might remove. If the committee meant to give a list of the reforms which ought to be accomplished before the throne was filled, the list was absurdly long. If, on the other hand, the committee meant to give a list of all the reforms which the legislature would do well to make in proper season, the list was strangely imperfect. Indeed, as soon as the report had been read, member after member rose to suggest some addition. It was moved and carried that the selling of offices should be prohibited, that the Habeas Corpus Act should be made more efficient, and that the law of mandamus be revised. One gentleman fell on the chimneymen; another on the excisemen; and the House resolved that the malpractices of both chimneymen and excisemen should be restrained. . .

The House was greatly perplexed. Some orators vehemently said that too much time had been already lost, and that the government ought to be settled without the delay of a day. Society was unquiet; trade was languishing; the English colony in Ireland was in imminent danger of perishing; a foreign war was impending; the exiled king might, in a few weeks, be at Dublin with a French army, and from Dublin he might soon cross to Chester. Was it not insanity, at such a crisis, to leave the throne unfilled, and, while the very existence of Parliaments was in jeopardy, to waste time in debating whether Parliaments should be prorogued by the sovereign or by themselves? On the other side it was asked whether the Convention could think that it had fulfilled its mission by merely pulling down one prince and putting up another.