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1529] bold a measure, yet a partial support from the other members was a sufficient encouragement. The aged Bishop of Rochester was made the spokesman of the ecclesiastics on this occasion. 'My Lords,' he said, 'you see daily what bills come hither from the Commons House, and all is to the destruction of the Church. For God's sake see what a realm the kingdom of Bohemia was; and when the Church went down, then fell the glory of that kingdom. Now with the Commons is nothing but Down with the Church, and all this meseemeth is for lack of faith only.' 'In result,' says Hall, 'the Acts were sore debated; the Lords Spiritual would in no wise consent, and committees of the two Houses sat continually for discussion.' The spiritualty defended themselves by prescription and usage, to which a Gray's Inn lawyer something insolently answered, on one occasion, 'the usage hath ever been of thieves to rob on Shooter's Hill, ergo, it is lawful.' 'With this answer,' continues Hall, 'the spiritual men were sore offended because their doings were called robberies, but the temporal men stood by their sayings, insomuch that the said gentleman declared to the Archbishop of Canterbury, that both the exaction of probates of testaments and the taking of mortuaries were open robbery and thefts.'

At length, people out of doors growing impatient, and dangerous symptoms threatening to show themselves, the King summoned a meeting in the Star-chamber