when she raised him to the primacy. To the establishment of this court, the Puritans themselves did not object, although they did to its rigors and unjust proceedings,2 nor do we find them taking exceptions to the very exceptionable language of the commission itself. Even Martin Marprelate complained not of the High-Commission Court, but of the Commissioners only. "Abuse not the High Commission, as you do, against the best subjects. The Commission itself was ordained for very good purposes, but it is most horribly abused by you, and turned clean contrary to the end wherefor it was ordained." 3

Both the ecclesiastical and the municipal courts but little regarded the principles of justice, the obvious rules of testimony, the rights of the citizen, or even the meaning and intent of statutes. But the illegal and oppressive proceedings of either branch of her judiciary may not be charged upon the queen, unless, indeed, it can be made to appear that such proceedings were by her direction. or had her connivance. This, we think, cannot be done. "She referred all ecclesiastical business wholly to Whitgift's management," and all civil prosecutions wholly to her judges. But the doings of these courts she did not and could not scrutinize, and we have yet to learn that she ever knew how frequently and flagrantly they violated their trust. She failed, to be sure, and culpably, to provide reasonable checks against the abuse of judicial power; but we find no evidence that she was privy Ante, p. 278.

1 Ante, Vol. II. p. 348. 2 Ibid., p. 386.

to the wrong done to Edward Deering and others, who were punished for opinions only;1 none that she authorized Whitgift's "Three Articles"; none that she sanctioned the enforcement of any other subscription than that required by statute; none that she justified the racking inquisition which her Primate instituted under her allowance of "the

corporal oath." On the other hand, it was her will that the servants of the crown, in each branch of the judiciary, should do justly, love mercy, and eschew all oppression of her people. That they did otherwise was their own sin, not hers.

2

That Queen Elizabeth was ignorant of the illegal and protracted imprisonment of the Puritans and Barrowists without hearing or trial, that she was ignorant of their cruel usage in prison, and of the slight grounds upon which some of them were condemned to the death of felons, we have sufficient evidence. Witness the facts, that Archbishop Whitgift sought, through false informations and suggestions, to incense her Majesty against them ; that their humble supplications to her were intercepted and suppressed; that her Master of Requests, Whitgift's creature, made it his custom to withhold such papers from her; and that, when one accidentally came to her hand, it was graciously

1 I have heretofore expressed myself as though Elizabeth were assenting to prosecutions for men's opinions only, and had, therefore, violated her royal pledge to the contrary. Such opinions were formed, penned, and printed before meeting with documents by which they have been materially

modified. It is now my opinion that she was not privy to such prosecutions, and that her great fault was her oversight in vesting her commissioners with powers but vaguely limited.

2 Witness her solemn charge, ante, Vol. I. p. 299.

received.1 Witness the language of a Puritan clergyman, when complaining of the outrages of Chief Justice Anderson: "Well, we will not be discour aged in our loyal affection to her Majesty, but will comfort ourselves with our rude country proverb, 'Much water goes by the mill that the miller never knows of' Yea, we are assured that her Majesty would not have her own religion discountenanced, nor her quiet and loving people disquieted and grieved."2 Witness the words of Penry: “I am assured, if her Majesty knew the equity and uprightness of our cause, we should not receive this hard measure which we now sustain. We and our cause are never brought before her but in the odious weeds of sedition, rebellion, schism, and heresy; and therefore it is no marvel to see the edge of her sword turned against us. I am assured, that if her Majesty may understand the uprightness of my cause in any sort, one hair of my head shall not perish." Witness the words of Barrow: "If her Majesty might be truly informed of the things which have passed, she would freely and fully pardon our execution." Witness the language of the suffering church of Separatists: "O that her Grace and you did understand all our actions, and did see the several declarations of our souls, and loyalty long since proved. We should not then be long in the hazard of utter spoil of our bodies and minds, of evil air and diet, of the poor remnant of our goods and of our families' destruction. We are persuaded that the execution of Barrow and Greenwood was rather importuned and 1 Ante, p. 501. Strype's Annals, VII. 372.

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hastened by others, than easily consented unto by her Grace."1 And finally, witness the lament of Elizabeth herself, when coolly told by her stern Primate that some of her subjects who had swung from the gibbet were the servants of God: "Alas! shall we put the servants of God to death?"

Waddington's Penry, 258, note, 268; Memorial of the Church to the Lord Mayor.

CHAPTER XIX.

PRINCIPLES AND LEGISLATION.

FALSE STATEMENTS RESPECTING THE PRINCIPLES AND BEHAVIOR OF THE PURITANS. THEIR DOINGS IN PARLIAMENT. THEIR PROGRESS TOWARD CIVIL LIBERTY.

To specify in detail the false statements which have obtained in history respecting the principles, purposes, and behavior of the Elizabethan Puritans, and to show the utter groundlessness of those statements, would be a protracted, but not difficult task. We give them only a passing notice, but sufficient for our purpose.

During this reign the Puritans were publicly charged with holding "that the people might lawfully resist the prince by force of arms if he hinder the building of the Church, i. e. their Presbyteries." 1 And even to the present generation it has been reiterated, not only that they held this doctrine, but that they did also plot and endeavor to carry it into practice. We have already produced evidence which, we think, will have convinced the reader to the contrary. Yet we will add the following solemn declaration, made in the year 1592, by the imprisoned Puritan ministers in a letter to her Majesty. "In all simplicity and purity of heart we declare, in the presence of Almighty God, to whom all secrets are

1 1 Hicks, 297.