find the monarch jealous of the privileges of the Commons, and claiming a royal prerogative in matters which the latter had taken under their especial charge. Whatever concerned the royal prerogative was considered by Elizabeth as forbidden ground, and she included within this description every thing that related to religion, to her particular courts, and to the succession to the crown; she insisted, in her own words, "that no bills touching matters of state or reformation in concerns ecclesiastical should be exhibited."* Pretensions of this character were not likely to pass current with men who already had a clear perception of their own rights and their own power. It was evident that a collision must sooner or later take place between the queen and her "faithful commons," for notwithstanding Elizabeth's remarkable popularity, there was a stern class of thinking men who. remained proof to her blandishments, and thought more of liberty to the people than gallantry to the queen.

Such a man was Peter Wentworth. In this uncompromising but loyal old Puritan, we have a perfect type of the stock which peopled the Eastern portions of our own country. Fearless, clear-headed, honest, and loyal, he was not only capable of asserting the privileges of the house, but of impressing others with the exactness of his definition of them. The event which drew Wentworth out was a commission issued by the queen, directing the speaker to stop a discussion in the house, and giving orders that in future "no bills concerning religion should be preferred or received into that house, unless the same should be first considered and approved of by the clergy." This interference on the part of the queen elicited a speech from Wentworth, in which he maintained that the house was assembled to make or abrogate such laws as were for the surety, safe-keeping, and enrichment of the noble realm of England. It was necessary for this purpose to preserve such advantages by free speech: without this it were a scorn and mockery to call the parliament a place of free speech. It was nothing but "a very school of flattery and dissimulation, and so a fit place to serve the devil and his angels in, and to glorify God and benefit

*Cobbett.

the commonwealth. Waxing still more bold, he went on to say, "that to avoid everlasting death and condemnation, with the high and mighty God, we ought to proceed in every cause according to the matter, and not according to the prince's mind." In a similar strain of independent protest and argument, the patriot dwelt on the message of the queen, giving the house and her majesty some sound advice and admonition. It was not altogether acceptable to either, for, before Wentworth had finished, the house stopped him. He was sequestered for said speech, and had to answer for it before a special committee. All that passed is singularly noble. "I do promise you all," said, the intrepid patriot, "if God forsake me not, that I will never during life hold my tongue if any message is sent wherein God is dishonored, the prince perilled, or the liberties of the parliament impeached." Wentworth was committed to prison; a fate which did not surprise him. In his examination before a committee, he observed: "I do assure your honors, that twenty times and more, when I walked in my grounds, revolving this speech, to prepare against this day, my own fearful conceit did say unto me that this speech would carry me to the place whither I shall now go, and fear would have moved me to put it out. Then I weighed whether in good conscience, and the duty of a faithful subject, I might keep myself out of prison, and not to warn my prince from walking in a dangerous course. My conscience said unto me, that I could not be a faithful subject if I did more respect to avoid my own danger than my prince's danger: herewithal I was made bold, and went forward, as your honors heard; yet when I uttered these words in the house, that there was none without fault-no! not our noble queen; I paused, and beheld all your countenances, and saw plainly that those words did amaze you all. Then fear bade me put out the words that followed, for your countenances did assure me that not one of you would stay me of my journey. But I spake it, and I praise God for it."

Wentworth was committed to the Tower, but Elizabeth was far too politic to allow such a man to become a martyr to the cause of

popular freedom. After a month's incarceration she remitted the sentence. The toadies of the house held forth hugely on the divine leniency of the queen, with which Wentworth may or may not have been impressed. Certain it is, that eleven years afterwards he was so dissatisfied with further encroachments on the privileges of the house, that he prepared in writing a series of tough queries, which he handed to the speaker. One of these was couched in the following words: "Whether there be any council which can make, add to, or diminish from the laws of this realm, but only this council of parliament." It was reserved for another century, in which other men of Wentworth's calibre were the actors, to answer this vital question. Much trial and tribulation were undergone before the people's indignant negative was recorded in the bloody scrolls of history. To that period we will now hasten.

The most momentous political occurrence of the sixteenth century was that which provoked the document called the Petition of Rights. This was the commencement of that memorable epoch, since denominated the English Revolution, and which, resulting in the execution of Charles the First, and the Protectorate of Oliver Cromwell, effected in a remarkable degree the early characteristics of this country. It was in this epoch that the word Puritan was first used. It stood for the appellation of three parties, all of them opposed to the intolerance of King Charles's reign. There were the political Puritans, who maintained the highest principles of civil liberty; the Puritans in discipline, who were averse to the ceremonies and Episcopal government of the Church; and the doctrinal Puritans who rigidly defended the speculative system of the first reformers.*

During two preceding reigns, the English people, as we have seen, had been gradually imbibing sentiments of enlarged political and religious freedom. Elizabeth, with a tact for which she was remarkable, conceded what was necessary. But imbecile James lacked the talent and the inclination to appreciate the wants of his people. In the midst of difficulties, dissensions, and civil commotions, and at a

* Hume.

time when practical common sense was especially demanded, he wrote and published an elaborate work on the divine right of kings. The object of this ridiculous production was, to prove that kings could do no wrong; that their prerogative was from Heaven; and that any encroachment on it was flagrant heresy! James's parliament soon became refractory. Public disapprobation increased with fearful rapidity. The king endeavored to get on without a parliament, and succeeded for a while in raising funds for the State exchequer. But there was great indignation, and the grievances of the nation were all converging to a crisis. King James died on the 27th March, 1625. Under his weak rule, the spirit of liberty had grown strong, and had become equal to a great contest.*

Charles I. succeeded to the throne. He was unlike his father in many respects; but he was false, imperious, obstinate, narrowminded, ignorant of the temper of his people, unobservant of the signs of the times,† and firm in the determination to protect what he conceived to be the prerogatives of the Crown. The spirit of reform had grown strong and muscular, but he thought he could strangle it with his weak hands. Failing in this, he tried, as the next best thing, to chastise it. Parliaments were assembled at the king's pleasure, and dissolved the moment they were found to be intractable. In consequence of the extreme difficulty with which the king raised supplies, he determined to resort to the illegal process of imposing a forced loan on the kingdom, thus subverting the entire object and usefulness of the House of Commons. Great numbers resisted this unjustifiable imposition, for which they were immediately thrown into prison. Foiled in his purpose, the king had once more to assemble parliament, and as a necessary consequence, one of the first discussions was on the late illegal proceedings of the Crown. The result of their discussions was, the document called the Petition of Right, so called because, although drawn up in the usual strain of a humble petition, it had all the force of a law on the king's endorsement of his concurrence. This document, which is justly considered the

second Great Charter of English liberty, was drawn up by Sir Edward Coke in the eighty-third year of his age. It was the last act of a brilliant judicial career, and is a lasting monument to Coke's patriotism and genius. It provided that no tax or loan might be levied except with the concurrence of parliament; that no man might be imprisoned but by legal process; that soldiers might not be quartered on people contrary to their will; and that no commissions be granted for executing martial law.* A few days after the receipt of the petition, the king returned an evasive answer. A discussion immediately ensued in the House of Commons. Among the eminent men who took part in it were Sir John Eliot, John Hampden, and John Pym; heroic names that adorn the brightest pages of political history.

Sir John Eliot spoke with dignity and fervor. "His mind," says Lord Nugent, "was deeply imbued with a love of philosophy and a confidence in religion, which gave a lofty tone to his eloquence." The effect of the debate was so seriously damaging to the king, and particularly to his pampered minister, Buckingham, that he could no longer withhold his consent to the Petition of Right. He gave it with surly remorse, but with a mental reservation that he would be avenged on the men who had extorted it from him. He again dissolved parliament, and determined to rule in his own right, without their aid or assistance. Two days later, he committed Sir John Eliot and other members to the Tower, on a charge of high treason. Servile courts sustained him in this flagrant breach of privilege and violation of the Petition of Right. But he was inexorable, and Eliot remained in prison-doomed to die a martyr in the cause of political liberty. After two years of wearisome confinement, his health began to fail. He petitioned for the privilege of a temporary release, that he might recuperate his sinking energies. But the king demanded concessions from him which, as an honest, high-purposed man, he could not make. Another year, passed in suffering and cruelty, terminated his life. He died in November, 1632. The vengeance of

* Goodrich.