Page:Cassell's Illustrated History of England vol 3.djvu/263

] unwilling to be cashiered; others would not serve under the new officers; and Dalbier, who had been one of the worst counsellors of Essex, lay apart with eight troops of horse, as if he contemplated going over to the king. At length, however, he came in, and the work was completed.

Whilst these things had been occurring in the field and the parliament, events had occurred also both in England and Scotland, which, not to interrupt the course of the higher transactions, have been deferred. From the month of June, 1643, the synod of divines at Westminster had been at work endeavouring to establish a national system of faith and worship. This Westminster assembly consisted of one hundred and twenty individuals appointed by the lords and commons. They included not only what were called pious, godly, and judicious divines, but thirty laymen, ten lords, and twenty commoners, and with them sate the Scottish commissioners. The Scotch and English presbyterians had a large majority, and endeavoured to fix on this nation their gloomy, ascetic, and persecuting notions; but, as we have Been, they found a small but resolute party of a more liberal faith, the independents, including Vane, Selden, and others, whose bearing and spirit, backed by Cromwell, Whitelock, St. John, and others in parliament, were more than a match for this overbearing intolerance. On the subject of church government, therefore, there could be no agreement. Cromwell demanded from the house of commons an act of toleration, and that a committee should be formed of deputies from both houses and from the assembly to consider it. The subject was long and fiercely debated, the lords Say and Wharton, Sir Henry Vane, and St. John contending for the independence of the church from all bishops, synods, and ruling powers whatever. The only thing agreed upon was, that the English common prayer book should be thrown overboard, and a directory of worship introduced which regulated the order of the service, the administration of the sacrament, the ceremonies of marriage and burial—but left much liberty to the minister in the matter of his sermons. This directory was, by an ordinance of both houses, ordered to be observed both in England and Scotland.

This must have been a grievous spectacle to poor old archbishop Laud, who was still in prison, and in the turmoil of civil war by many totally forgotten. But the puritans of England and the people of Scotland needed only a slight reminder to demand the punishment of the man who, with so high a hand, had trodden down their liberties and their religion. This was given them by the lords, who, insisting on appointing ministers to livings in his gift, called on Laud to collate the vacant benefices to such persons as they should nominate. The king forbade him to obey. At length, in February 1643, the rectory of Chartham, in Kent, became vacant by the death of the incumbent, the lords nominated one person, the king another, and Laud, placed in a dilemma dangerous to his life under his circumstances, endeavoured to excuse himself by remaining passive. But the lords, in the month of April, sent him a peremptory order, and on his still delaying, sent a request to the commons to proceed with his trial. There were fourteen articles of impeachment already hanging over his head, and the commons appointed Prynne, still smarting under the ear-lopping, branding, and cruelties of the archbishop, to collect evidence and co-operate with a committee on the subject.

What an apparition must that earless man, with those livid brand marks on his cheeks, have been as he entered the cell of Laud, and told him that the day of retribution was come. Prynne collected all his papers, even the diary which he had been so long employed in writing, as the defence of his past life, and sought in every quarter for remaining victims and witnesses of his persecutions and cruelties, to bring them up against him. In six months the committee had collected evidence enough to furnish ten new articles of impeachment against him, and on the 4th of March, 1644, more than three years after his commitment, he was called upon to take his trial. He demanded time to consult his papers, and to have them for that purpose restored, to have counsel, and money out of the proceeds of his estate to pay his fees and other necessary expenses. He was not likely to find much more tenderness from his enemies than he had showed to them; the Scotch demanded stern justice upon him, as the greatest enemy which their country had known for ages. Time was given him till the 12th of March, when he was brought to the bar of the house of lords. There, after the once haughty but now humbled summus pontifex had been made to kneel a little, Mr. Serjeant Wild opened the case against him, and went over, at great length, the whole story of his endeavours to introduce absolutism in church and state in England, Scotland, and Ireland, and the dreadful cruelties and oppressions which he had inflicted on the king's subjects in the Star-chamber and High Commission Courts.

When he had done, Laud defended himself from a written paper, contending that though he had leaned towards the law, he had never intended to overthrow the laws, and that he had in the church laboured only for the support of the external form of worship, which had been neglected. But the hearers had not forgotten the "Thorough," nor the utter suppression of all forms of religion but his own, the sweeping away utterly of the faith of Scotland, and the substitution of Arminianism and the liturgy.

It was not till the 2nd of September that Laud was called to the bar of the lords to deliver his recapitulation of the arguments in answer to his charges. Mr. Samuel Brown, a member of the commons, and a manager of the trial, replied to them. Laud was then allowed counsel to speak to the parts of law, who took the same course of defence as had been taken in the case of Stratford, declaring that the prisoner's offence did not amount to high treason, and the commons then adopted their plan in Strafford's case, of proceeding by attainder. He was, therefore, on the 2nd of November, brought to the bar of their own house, where Mr. Brown repeated the sum of the evidence produced in the lords, and Laud was called on to reply himself to charges. He demanded time to prepare his answer, and obtained eight days. On the 11th of November he was heard, and Brown in reply; and the commons the same day passed their bill of attainder, finding him fully convicted of the offences charged against him. On the 16th they sent up this bill to the lords; but it was not till the 4th of January, 1645, that the lords also passed the bill, and soon after fixed the day of his execution for the 10th. The last