Page:American Historical Review, Volume 12.djvu/757

 Nicholas Fuller •47 I from the King's Bench writs of habeas corpus for the two men (April 30. 1607) and secured ]Iay 6 as a date for the hearing. In his argument, he proceeded to prove^ to his own satisfaction at least, that his clients must be released because the High Commission had no legal authority to imprison them. That court, he declared, was based upon the statute of i Elizabeth, c. i., section viii., which gave to the commissioners only such power as the bishops of the Church had possessed before the passage of that statute. By references to acts of Parliament, and by somewhat questionable deductions and analogies from them, he sought to demonstrate that the bishops had never had authority previous to 1559 to fine or imprison. The Commission therefore could possess such a power, he asseverated, only by an act of Parliament, and the statute of i Elizabeth, the only one which could' legalize the exercise of such authority, did not sanction it. He then read the act in court and interpreted it for the edification of his audience. Finally he proceeded to compare the extensive powers which every one knew the Commission employed, with the grant of authority to them in the act, and pointed out in voluminous detail and with many comments derogatory to the Commission, the discrepancies between the two. He paid little attention however to the fact that the royal letters patent which the statute did authorize, conferred on the High Commission by express language or by implication every power it put in practice. It was enough for him that the statute itself did not directly make any such comprehensive grant. His argument was ofifensive enough, but his comments* made it " smell to heaven "'. He declared that the manner of proceeding in the commission was " popish '' ; that " the ecclesiasticall jurisdiction was Anti-Christian '" and " not of Christ but of Anti-Christ " ; that the power of the Commission was being used to suppress the sacra- ment and true religion. To his mind, the bishops " did proceede in these dayes by taking an ell whereby they had but an ynch granted them, and in examining men upon their oathes at their discretion ' Exactly what Fuller said at these two hearings is very difficult to determine satisfactorily. The indictment of the High Commission against him given in Lansdowne MSS., 1172, does not detail his speech but only recounts the points to be used legally against him. The tract which is ostensibly the actual speech he delivered, is certainly only a speech which he drew up (if he ever- wrote it at all ) after these two hearings, for use before the twelve judges in September, 1607 (Hatfield MSS., 124, f. 59). The tract was printed in December, probably without his knowledge (Hatfield MSS., 124, f. 81). Nevertheless, the main legal contention there set forth may be accepted without much hesitation as the substance of what he said on May 6 and June 13 much expanded and embellished, and with many significant omissions.
 * These are to be found only in Lansdowne MSS., 11 72.