Page:The History of the Church & Manor of Wigan part 2.djvu/182

Rh to refer it to the Lord Keeper [ Thomas, Lord Coventry], the Lord Privy Seal [ the Earl of Manchester], the Lord Cottington, and [Sir Francis] Windebank.

This move on the part of Sir Thomas had the effect of making the bishop the defendant in the action instead of the complainant. In his answer, given on 31st May to the charges of Sir Thomas, he declares that he has never complained, or wished to complain, of the King's intent and service in the matter, which he has with all humility acknowledged, both before the lords of the council and the lords and others of the high commission, to be just and gracious. He believes that he once occasionally said before the lords of the high commission that he conceived his Majesty's pleasure was that only matters of commutation should be questioned, and that it was hard that under pretence thereof all his other actions should be inquired into and so many scandalous articles of other nature preferred against him. But how lawfully he has exercised his ecclesiastical jurisdiction and how far his case differs from the rest of the bishops therein he hopes will appear in the high commission where his cause now depends. He considered himself injured, however, by Sir Thomas Canon in the ways before mentioned; and, as to the words he (Sir Thomas) charges him with having spoken against him, he says that words to the same effect had been occasionally spoken by him at the council board since the late reference was made by his Majesty, and he doubts not that he shall make good proof of whatever he has said, though he does not remember the exact words that he used. The bishop appears to have put in his final answer on 16th June. The issue of this second commission does not appear, but it had the effect of keeping him at least another month in London, and probably resulted in leaving the matter very much as it was before. Archbishop Laud, in writing to the bishop some time afterwards on other matters, expresses a