and others interceded with the king in their favour; but his majesty answered, we must believe our archbishop, who used their deputies very roughly, calling them a nest of schismaticks, and telling them it were better to have no foreign churches, than to indulge their nonconformity. In conclusion he assured them, his majesty was resolved his injunctions should be observed; that he expected all obedience and conformity from them; and that he should else proceed against the natives according to the laws and canons ecclesiastical; accordingly some of their churches were indicted, others shut up, and the assemblies dissolved; their ministers were suspended, many of their people left the kingdom. In the diocese of Norwich only, three thousand manufacturers in wool, cloth, &c. were drove away; some of whom employed an hundred poor people at work, to the unspeakable damage of the kingdom."-Neal, Vol. 11. p. 268.

"The bishop of Norwich," says Coke, "straining these injunctions, frightened thousands of families out of Norfolk and Suffolk into New-England. And about an hundred and forty families of these manufacturers went into Holland, where the Dutch, as wise as queen Elizabeth was in entertaining the Walloons persecuted by the Duke of Alva, established these English excise-free and rent-free for seven years; and from them became instructed in working those manufactures, which before they knew not."-Coke, Detec. p. 109, 199.

Lord Clarendon speaking of the activity which many of the Hugonots of France manifested against king Charles I. acknowledges, "that the occasion whence this disaffection grew, was very unskilfully and imprudently administered by the state here. Not to speak of the business of Ro

chell, though it stuck deep in all (of which see above, Chap. II.) they had a greater quarrel, which made them believe, that their very religion was persecuted by the church of England."Clarend. Vol. III. p. 95, 96. His lordship having mentioned the great piety and policy of all our former princes, from Edward VI. down to the present time, in drawing over, by all means, great numbers of these foreign protestants, and giving them liberty in all places to erect churches and to worship according to their own way, adds," But some few years before these troubles, when the power of churchmen grew more transcendant, and indeed the faculties and understanding of the laycounsellors more dull, lazy and unactive, the bishops grew jealous that the countenancing another discipline of the church here, by order of the state, would at least diminish the reputation and dignity of the episcopal government." proceeded with great rigor, as above related, against them; which his lordship with his usual gentleness, when touching on these points, calls, "Doing some acts of restraint; with which those congregations grew generally discontented, and thought the liberty of their conscience taken from them: this caused in London much complaining of this kind; but much more in the diocese of Norwich, where Dr. Wren, the bishop, passionately and warmly proceeded against them; so that many left the kingdom, to the lessening the wealthy manufacture there of kerseys and narrow cloths; and which was worse, transporting that mystery into foreign parts."

"To avoid the high commission and spiritual courts the persecuted protestants crowded the sea ports to get over to America."-Hist. Stu. p. 131. "So that in about twelve years of this reign, there went over about 4000 planters; who laid the foundation of several little towns and villages up

and down the country; and carried hence in money, cattle, &c. not less than to the value of an hundred and ninety-two thousand pounds, besides the merchandize sent over with them to traffic with the Indians. Upon the whole, it has been computed that the settlements in New England, which were accomplished before the beginning of the civil wars, drained England of four or five hundred thousand pounds in money: a very great sum for those days."-Neal, Vol. 11. p. 214.

The terrible proceedings of this reign did no service to church or state, but awakened the resentments of all ranks and professions of men against those in power. "The laity were as uneasy as the clergy, many of whom sold their effects and removed with their families and trades into Holland and New England.-But the king issued out a proclamation, importing, that being informed that great numbers of his subjects were yearly transported to New England, THAT THEY MIGHT BE OUT OF THE REACH OF ECCLESIASTICAL AUTHORITY, therefore commands that his officers of the several ports suffer none to pass without licence from the commissioners of the plantations, and a testimonial from their minister of their conformity to the orders and discipline of the church. And that no clergyman be suffered to transport himself without a testimonial from the Archbishop of Canterbury and Bishop of London."-Ibid. p. 300.

"A degree of severity," says the historian, "hardly to be parralleled in the christian world. When the edict of Nantz was revoked, the French king (with all his popish tyrannical principles) allowed his protestant subjects a convenient time to dispose of their effects and leave the kingdom." -Ibid. But this was an indulgence not granted by

king Charles: he will neither suffer his subjects to worship according to the dictates of their conscience, and to live peaceably at home; nor to seek a quiet retreat abroad in some distant and desolate corner of the earth.

And here behold the unsearchable wisdom of Providence! By one of these tyrannical orders of council eight ships were stopt at once in the river of Thames, bound for New England, full of puritan familics, amongst whom were the famous Sir Arthur Haselrigs, John Hambden, Esq. OLIVER CROMWELL, (afterwards protector) with many others of the same stamp, who were actually embarked, and would have sailed the next day, had they not been thus arbitrarily stayed by the king.

To pass by many instances of terrible rigour in the treatment of Bishop Williams, Messrs. Burton, Lilburn, Smart, Osbaldeston, &c. let it suffice to relate the cases of each of the three learned professions, a lawyer, a physician, and a divine, to shew the spirit of this reign.

"William Prynne, Esq. a noted gentleman of Lincoln's-Inn (of whom Archdeacon Echard says, that he brought some learning from Oxford, which he daily improved by indefatigable study) published a book called Histrio-Mastir against plays, which was licensed by Archbishop Abbot's chaplain. In the reference table of the book was this passage, women actors notorious whores, relating to some women actors mentioned in his book, as he affirmed. It happened that about six weeks after this, the queen acted a part in a pastoral at Somerset house. Archbishop Laud and other prelates, whom Prynne had angered by some books of his against arminianism and against the jurisdiction of bishops, the next day after the queen had acted her pastoral, shewed Prynne's

book to the king and queen; and informed them, that he had purposely written this book against the queen and her pastoral, whereas it was published six weeks BEFORE that pastoral was acted, -Laud set Heylin, who bare a great malice to Prynne, to collect the scandalous points out of his books, though (as Prynne affirms) not at all warranted by the text of his books. Laud went with these books, on a Sabbath-day morning, to the attorney-general, charging him to prosecute Prynne; and the bishops and lords in the star-chamber sent him close prisoner to the Tower.--The archbishop Laud procured a sharp sentence against him, viz. to be imprisoned during his life, fined five thousand pounds, expelled Lincoln's-Inn, disbarred and disabled to practice, degraded of his degree in the university, to be set on the pillory and his ears to be cut off, and his book to be burnt by the common hangman: which sentence, says Whitelock, was as severely executed." Echard, p. 455.-Whitelock's Mem. p. 18, 21.

"All this was done upon Heylin's inferences and conclusions: and no passage of Prynne's book was laid in the information brought against him. But the punctilios of law were a trifle to these men. The queen interceded with the king to remit the execution of the sentence, but Laud prevailed, and got all the corporal punishment inflicted to a tittle.

"At the same same time Dr. Bastwick, a physician, was brought into the high commission court for his book called Elenchus Papismi, &c. or, the Scourge of the Romish Bishops, in answer to one Short, a papist, who maintained the pope's supremacy, the mass and popery and Bastwick's epistle to his book declared, that he intended nothing against our bishops, but against those of Rome. Yet this doctor was sentenced by the