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VII.

16.2.

BOOK sand pounds. Some were dead, or had resided abroad during the civil wars; others were infants; but to every objection there was a prompt reply; that the penalties were a composition for an indemnity which the innocent might relinquish, and, at their own peril, procure an exemption when pursued for their fines. Innocence, under a despotical government, was a dangerous alternative that would be embraced by none; but the fines which Middleton and his friends expected were intercepted by his fall, and reserved for the crown, as a subject of future oppression to the people."1

Lord Lorn

condemned

making.

But the avarice of Middleton was insatiable; and for leasing his revenge was neither restrained by prudence, remorse, nor fear. The estate and titles of Argyle were solicited by his ambition, and the destruction of that unfortunate family was the object of his eager, unrelenting pursuit. Lord Lorn, in a confidential letter from court to his friend lord Duffus, had complained, perhaps with an unguarded freedom, of the calumnies employed to injure his credit with the king; but that he had discovered and defeated his enemies, and gained the man (the earl of Clarendon) on whom their leader (Middleton's) dependence was placed. The letter was intercepted by Middleton; and at the request of parliament, Lorn was remanded to Scotland for trial. It was peculiar perhaps to the Scottish jurisprudence, to

21 Burnet, 211.

VII.

1662.

prohibit the arts of court defamation as leasing- BOOK making, and to punish the complaints of the sufferers as sedition. As the complaint of calumnies, industriously conveyed to the royal ear, was calculated to excite sedition, or to sow dissensions between the king and the people, Lorn, on his arrival, was arraigned on those old and tyrannical laws; and upon his implicit submission to the mercy of the sovereign, for defence was unavailing, the same parliament, which in the preceding session had condemned his father, pronounced a similar sentence of death on the son. His execu- Aug. 26., tion was referred to Middleton, his implacable enemy; but his life was preserved by the injunctions of Charles, that no sentence should be inflicted without permission from court. But an act of unexampled severity was passed, to prohibit all intercession for the children of persons attainted in parliament, and to render them incapable of being restored by the king to their titles and estate. No penalty was annexed to the act; for it was an approved maxim among the advocates for prerogative, that to specify the punishment imposed an undue limitation on the crown; but that a prohibitory act without a penalty, might extend to any arbitrary punishment that should be inflicted, less than death.22

22 Burnet, 215. Wodrow, i. 235-8. Kirkton, MS. 22.38. Brown's Miscellanea Aulica, 209. See in Sir G. Mackenzie's Works, i. 401. an instance of this doctrine.

BOOK
VII.

1662.

Act of

Having persuaded the king that the parliament was desirous to incapacitate a few obnoxious delinquents from public trust, Middleton artfully inballoting. fused an opposite idea into parliament, that the king was secretly disgusted at Lauderdale, and solicitous of such a decent pretext for his removal from office. An act was prepared for the incapacitation of twelve persons by ballot, the result of which was to be scrutinized by a secret committee, and not divulged till approved by the king. The members were previously instructed how to frame their lists; and the earls of Lauderdale and Crawford were disqualified, among others, from public trust. The mail was diligently inspected; the stages were secured, to prevent the secret from transpiring at court; but lord Lorn transmitted the intelligence by private roads, and requited Lauderdale for the preservation of his life. Before the arrival of the commissioners from parliament, the king and Clarendon were prepossessed against the report which was indignantly rejected; and the advantage was improved and pursued by Lau derdale to his rival's disgrace. Though public employments might sometimes be conferred by ballot, punishments by ballot were never inflicted. But by a deception alternately practised on the parliament and on the king, an invisible judgment was pronounced by ballot, in which the malice of his enemies was securely gratified, and a punishment not less severe than iniquitous, was dispensed

VII.

without accusation or proof, and even without in- BOOK timation of the impending danger.23, Clarendon acknowledged that the measure was inexcusable, 1662. but endeavoured to preserve his friend from disgrace, and until the king's anger should subside, advised him to proceed with diligence to enforce the laws so recently enacted for the preservation of the church.

ejected

When the bishops held their diocesan synods, Clergy most of the ministers in the north submitted. In the western counties their resolution not to observe the acts, nor to acknowledge, by any canonical obedience, the jurisdiction of the prelates, was confirmed by the patient fortitude of the numerous clergy, whom the act of uniformity had ejected in England. They concerted measures to avoid offence to the state if tolerated, but if silenced, to submit at once to the injunctions of the council; and expected, from the desolate state to which the church would be reduced, that if they stood and suffered together, they would soon be replaced. But the same example had instigated the fierce disposition of Middleton, to retrieve his declining credit at court, by adopting the most exceptionable, and perhaps the only measure in the administration of Clarendon, which fixes on the

23 Miscellanea Aulica, 213. Lauderdale's charge against Middleton is written with a vigour and eloquence seldom to be found in state papers; and conveys an advantageous idea of his talents.

VII.

1662.

Oct. 1.

BOOK memory of that statesman an indelible stain of du plicity and persecution. In a progress through the western counties, an act of council was framed in a fit of absolute intoxication at Glasgow. Whatsoever ministers had neglected or declined to procure presentations from their patrons, and induction from the prelates, were ordered to remove from their parishes, or to be displaced if necessary Nov. 1. by military force. Three hundred and fifty clergymen were ejected from their livings; above a third part of the church was displanted, and the tears excited by their valedictory sermons, were due to their sufferings, when expelled from their homes in the winter season; deprived of their stipends due for the preceding year; and with their numerous families left destitute of support. The commissioner imagined that the greater number would solicit indulgence or collation from their ordinaries, while the resistance of a few zealots would justify the severities which he was prepared to inflict. Their unexpected submission disappointed, but did not disarm his resentment. The most distinguished clergymen were selected for persecution, on the recent oath of allegiance to the king. However willing to acknowledge that his majesty was supreme civil governor in ecclesiastical affairs, their explanation of the oath was rejected; and as no penalties were annexed to the act, they were either confined to remote districts, or enjoined to banish themselves from the king

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