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 measures by which government after the Revolution shewed an inclination to interfere with the management of the Church, and they positively refused to take the oath of allegiance to King William and Queen Mary, until they should, on their part, have sworn to the Solemn League and Covenant, the Magna Charta, as they termed it, of the Presbyterian Church.

This party, therefore, remained grumbling and dissatisfied, and made repeated declarations against defections and causes of wrath, which, had they been prosecuted as in the two former reigns, would have led to the same consequence of open rebellion. But as the murmurers were allowed to hold their meetings uninterrupted, and to testify as much as they pleased against Socinianism, Erastianism, and all the compliances and defections of the time, their zeal, unfann'd by persecution, died gradually away, their numbers became diminished, and they sunk into the scattered remnant of serious, scrupulous,