Page:Dean Aldrich A Commemoration Speech.djvu/15

 Commission, which tallies with the position taken up by Aldrich in the Convocation which trod on the heels of this Commission. There we have few records of his words; but the temper of opposition to the designs of Tillotson evidently found a consistent representative in Aldrich. For instance, he is chosen with Dean Kidder to represent to the Lords the objections of the Lower House to classing the Church with other Protestant bodies in an address to the king. He is on a Committee which forces the Bishops to dissolve this close union, and which refuses to consent to any the slightest equivocation that might seem to slur the difference or bridge the breach. Aldrich thus put himself in the front of that strong feeling which, throughout this Convocation, preserved the intensity of the Church at the price of its extension.

In 1692, while England was exultant over the glory of La Hogue, and Scotland shuddering over the shame of Glencoe, Aldrich became Vice-Chancellor, the last Vice-Chancellor from this House till the honour was again renewed for us in the person of a Dean who has seen, during his Vice-Chancellorship, France suffer a greater rebuff even than La Hogue, on the fields of Worth, Sedan, and Gravelotte. He held the office throughout 1693, in the December of which year he set his name to the banishment of Antony à Wood, in the Proctors' Black Book; and at the renewal of the office for 1694, while William was struggling against France in the Netherlands, Aldrich spoke a speech against 'hatts turned up on one side.'

But the most exciting time of Aldrich's life has yet to come, and here we find the old contrast between himself and