From its long duration, it has been called the Long Parliament.

To the early part of the period between the accession of the monarch, and the meeting of the long parliament, we must assign the mitigated execution of the laws against the catholics, which is mentioned in our extracts from father Leander and Panzani.

A work of the celebrated Prynne*, shows equally the amiable disposition of the monarch to gentleness and mercy, and his culpable timidity.-It contains "several letters of grace, protection, and "warrants of discharge, granted by him to notorious popish recusants, priests and jesuits, to exempt them from all prosecutions and penal laws against them, signed with his own hand;" and "a note of the names of those recusants, against "whom process had been stayed by his privy

66

signet." By a certificate produced by Mr. Prynne, under the hand of Mr. John Pulford, the officer employed in these prosecutions, it appears that the number of recusants-convict in the twenty-nine counties, within the southern division of England, from the first till the sixteenth year of the reign of his majesty, amounted to 11,970. A list follows, of "discharges of priests and jesuits, under the king's "councils and secretary Windebanck's hands†."

"The Popish Royall Favourite: or a full Discovery of "his Majestie's extraordinary Favours to and Protections of "notorious Papists, Priests, Jesuits, against all prosecutions "and penalties of the laws enacted against them, &c. Col"lected and published by authority of Parliament, by William "Prynne, of Lincoln's-Inn, esq. 4to. 1643."

See his majesty's commission to compound with recusants, Rushworth, vol. i. p. 413.

The whole of this work bears testimony to the moderation of the monarch; and this did him the greater honour, as his attachment to his own religion was perfectly sincere: but it equally shows the persecuting spirit both of the multitude and their leaders.

In the articles of peace, presented to the monarch in 1646*, it was expressly stipulated, that "nothing contained in them, should extend to a "toleration of the popish religion, nor to exempt any popish recusant from any penalties imposed 66 on him for the increase of the same."

But, even during this period of mildness, as it has been termed, one priest, Mr. Edward Arrowsmith, of the society of Jesus, suffered death, merely upon the charge of being a priest and jesuit, and a persuader of others to the catholic religion, without the slightest proof of either crime. He was executed at Lancaster in 1628: "Divers protest"ants," says the printed relation of his death, "beholders of the bloody spectacle, wished their "souls with his. Others wished they had never "come there; others said it was a barbarous act "to use men so, for their religion.'

"From this year," says Dr. Challoner (from whom we have copied this extract), "till 1641, "I find no more blood shed for religious matters, "though, as to other penalties, they were frequently inflicted upon priests and other catholics: severe proclamations were issued against them,

* Thurloe's State Papers, vol. i. p. 77. Rush. vol. i. part iv. p. 309.

66

heavy fines laid upon them, and the prisons filled "with them; insomuch that, in the compass of "one year alone, there were twenty-six priests, of "divers orders, seized and committed to that one

prison called the Clink; to speak nothing of "those that were confined elsewhere*."

CHAP. LX.

THE CIVIL WAR,-PRESBYTERIANS,—INDE

PENDENTS.

THE history of the civil war does not belong to these pages it is written by Hume, with great ability and with much less partiality than is commonly allowed. On a dispassionate review of it, there appears strong ground to contend, that the objects of the popular party were for a considerable time after its commencement justifiable, both on principle and by precedent; but that neither the nature nor extent of the principles or precedents being clear, much may be offered in exculpation of the monarch: nor can it be denied that, to attain their aims, the parliamentary leaders encouraged the grossest and foulest calumnies both of his actions and his designs, and too successfully practised every other artifice to inflame the passions of the multitude against him. Things may be supposed to have continued in this state till the petition

Dr. Challoner's Memoirs of Missionary Priests, ad ann. 1628, p. 123, 148.

of right in 1628. From this time, the sins of each side increased till the remonstrance of 1641; after which, the overthrow of the ancient monarchical government of the kingdom was, unquestionably, the object of the agitators, and Charles may be said generally to have been its defender. The confederacy with the Scots, and the solemn league and covenant, consummated the guilt of his enemies, and were equally fatal to the consitution and the monarch. The triumph of the presbyterians was then complete; and they no sooner obtained the ascendancy under the long parliament, than they imposed, with the same rigour as their predecessors had done, their own creeds and confessions; and invested their magistrates with the same power of punishing, with pains and penalties, dissenters from their establishment.

But in the mean time, the Independents, a new denomination of religionists, arose, and after sheltering themselves for some time under the wings of the presbyterians, usurped by degrees the scene of action, and obtained the ascendancy. "Then "arose," says Bossuet*, " a man of unfathomable depth of thought; as subtle a hypocrite as he "was a consummate politician; equally impene"trable in peace and war; leaving nothing to for"tune, which he could keep, by wisdom or fore"sight, from her power; but, at the same time, always so well prepared, as never to let slip any opportunity of which he could avail himself, to

66

* In his Funeral Oration on Henrietta-Maria, the widow of Charles the first.

"his advantage.-In fine,-one of those active "spirits, who seem born for the disturbance of the "world. What does not such a man achieve, "when it pleases the Almighty to make him an "instrument of his wrath!"

Such is the description given by Bossuet of this celebrated person. To explain the genius of his party, and the difference of its principles and views from those of the presbyterians, we shall transcribe the following masterly view which is given of them by Hume.

"During those times, when the enthusiastic "spirit met with such honour and encouragement, "and was the immediate means of distinction and "preferment, it was impossible to set bounds to "the holy fervours, or confine, within any natural "limits, what was directed towards an infinite "and a supernatural object. Every man, as "prompted by the warmth of his temper, excited "by emulation, or supported by his habits of hypo“ crisy, endeavoured to distinguish himself beyond "his fellows, and to arrive at a higher pitch of "saintship and perfection. In proportion to its

degree of fanaticism, each sect became dangerous and destructive; and as the independents "went a note higher than the presbyterians, they "could less be restrained within any bounds of "temper and moderation. From this distinction, "as from a first principle, were derived, by a necessary consequence, all the other differences of "these two sects.

"The independents rejected all ecclesiastical