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 20, 22, 33, 40, 45). He supported Pym in endeavouring to carry the impeachment to its legitimate conclusion, and opposing the resolution to proceed by bill of attainder (, Studies, p. 337; , Grand Remonstrance, ed. 1860, pp. 133, 141; , ix. 329). After the second reading of the bill of attainder (14 April 1641), a serious difference arose between the two houses. The majority of the commons wished to abandon altogether the forms of an impeachment, to put an end to all discussion on the question whether Strafford's acts legally amounted to treason, and neither to hear the arguments of Strafford's counsel on that point nor to permit their own to reply to them. Hampden spoke with great effect in favour of a compromise (16 April 1641). He urged that the fact that an attainder bill was pending did not bind the commons to proceed by that method alone. Their counsel had been already heard, and it was only just to hear those of Strafford also. He was so far successful that Strafford's counsel were heard by parliament on 17 April, and the danger of a quarrel with the lords was averted (ib. ix. 337;, Notes of the Long Parliament, p. 50).

Yet while thus eager for the punishment of the king's evil ministers, Hampden, like his party, had no aversion to monarchy, and was anxious to lay the foundation of a permanent agreement between the king and his parliament. The feeling is well expressed in the words attributed to him later: 'Perish may that man and his posterity that will not deny himself in the greatest part of his fortune (rather than the king shall want) to make him both potent and beloved at home, and terrible to his enemies abroad, if he will be pleased to leave those evil counsells about him, and take the wholesome advice of his great counsell the parliament' (The Weekly Intelligencer, 27 June to 4 July 1643). In the summer of 1641 rumours went abroad that the king had resolved to admit some of the parliamentary leaders to office. It was reported in July that Hampden was to be secretary of state, and Nicholas mentions him as about to be appointed chancellor of the duchy of Lancaster (Cal. State Papers, Dom. 1641-3, pp. 53, 63). His own ambition is said to have been to be governor of the Prince of Wales, that so he might imbue the prince with 'principles suitable to what should be established as laws' (Memoirs of Sir Philip Warwick, p. 242). Any such projects, however, were frustrated by the increasing divisions on the church question, and the decided views held by Hampden himself on the subject of episcopacy. In early life he had not been accounted a puritan. 'In his entrance into the world he indulged to himself all the license in sports and exercises and company which was used by men of the most jolly conversation. Afterwards he retired to a more reserved and melancholic society,' and 'they who conversed nearly with him found him growing into a dislike of the ecclesiastical government of the church, yet most believed it rather a dislike of some churchmen' (, Rebellion, vii. 82). At the visitation of the diocese of Lincoln in 1634 Hampden was presented for two ecclesiastical offences, 'holding a muster in the churchyard of Beaconsfield, and for going sometimes from his own parish church.' On giving satisfaction to the visitor for his offences, and promising obedience to the laws of the church hereafter, he escaped punishment (Cal. State Papers, Dom. 1634-5, p. xxxii). He was not in 1640 deemed one of the 'root-and-branch' men, and though he supported the acceptance of the London petition against episcopacy, agreed to a compromise by which that institution should be reformed and not abolished (ib. iii. 147, 152;, History of England, ix. 281). But when the bill for the exclusion of the bishops from the House of Lords failed to pass, Hampden became a zealous supporter of the root-and-branch bill, thus losing the friendship of Falkland, and putting an end to any prospect of preferment.

On 20 Aug. the parliament appointed a committee to attend the king to Scotland, and Hampden was one of the four commissioners of the commons (, iii. 254, iv. 18; the instructions of the committee are printed in Lords' Journals, iv. 372, 401). The knowledge which he thus gained of the king's intrigues with the Scottish nobles no doubt led him to distrust the king, and the discovery of the plot known as 'The Incident' could only increase his suspicions. 'This plot,' wrote the commissioners, 'hath put not only ours but all other business to a stand, and may be an occasion of many and great troubles in this kingdom if Almighty God in his great mercy do not prevent it' (Lords' Journals, v. 398; Hist. MSS. Comm. 4th Rep. p. 102). By the middle of November Hampden was back at Westminster, zealously supporting the Grand Remonstrance, which he described as wholly true in substance, and as a very necessary vindication of the parliament (, Notes of the Long Parliament, p. 124). In the tumult which arose when the minority attempted to enter a protest against printing it, Hampden's presence of mind and authority were conspicuously displayed. 'I thought,' says Warwick, 'we had all sat in 