the king had signed the bill, he sent secretary CarJeton to the earl to acquaint him with what was done, who seriously asked the secretary, whether his majesty had passed the bill? As not believing without some astonishment that the king would have done it. And being assured it was passed, he rose up from his chair, lift up his eyes to heaven, laid his hand upon his heart, and said, Put not your trust in princes, nor in the sons of men, for in them there is no salvation.

"Great censures were past upon the king's signing this bill, as a giving up his most faithful servant. Certainly he had great remorse thereupon; for he had forced the earl, contrary to his own earnest desire, to appear in parliament, and promised that they should not touch an hair of his head."-Whitelock's Mem. p. 44.-Ibid. p. 36.

"The king's former promise of protection, archdeacon Echard observes, "must needs be very uneasy to him in this emergency. His majesty was soon sensible of his error, and always remembered it with infinite regret, and as the just cause of all his misfortunes. It is observed that this sin was one of those that carry their own punishment along with them, and naturally produce it, abstractedly from the remorse of conscience, and the chastisement of heaven. The king's mind was filled with relenting thoughts and melancholy reflections."-Echard, p. 503.

"His majesty sent for Hollis, whose sister the earl of Strafford had married (and who was of great influence in the house of commons) to know what he could do to save the earl. Hollis advised the king to come next day with a petition in his hands, and lay it before the two houses: with a speech which he drew up for the king, and he said, he would try his interest among his friends to get them to consent to it. He prepared a great.

many by assuring them that if they would save lord Strafford, he would become wholly theirs in consequence of his first principles. In this he had wrought on so many, that he believed if the king's party had struck into it, he might have saved him. It was carried to the queen, as if Hollis had engaged that the earl should accuse her, and discover all he knew. So the queen not only diverted the king from going to the parliament, changing the speech into a message, but to the wonder of the whole world, the queen prevailed with him to add that mean postscript, if he must die, it were charity to reprieve him till Saturday; which was a very unhandsome giving up the whole message. When it was communicated to both houses, the whole court party was plainly against it: and so he fell truly by the queen's means."-Burnet, Vol. 1. p. 32.

Finally; it was this artifice and dissimulation, with which the king's conduct too generally aboun ded, that principally hastened his catastrophe at last. Whilst the parliament were negociating the terms of his restoration (when a prisoner at Hampton-court) "He made a secret agreement with Cromwell; by which, if the king closed with the propositions of the army, Cromwell was to be advanced to a degree higher than any other; to be vicar-general of England, as Cromwell was under Henry VIII.

While the affair was transacting, "the king wrote to the queen, That though he assented to the army's proposals, yet if thereby he could procure peace, it would be easier then to take off Cromwell, than now he was the head that gocerned the army.

"Cromwell, who had his spies upon every mo, tion of the king, intercepts these letters, and resolved never to trust the king again."-Coke, Det,

p. 188. And so finding matters come to this dan gerous extremity, that either the king or himself must fall, from henceforward, it is thought, he resolved to secure himself by the king's execution.

CHAP. XIII.

Of the King's magnified Piety, and Concern for real Religion.

"KING Charles's court," Echard acknowledges, was corrupt in manners: full of excess, idleness, and luxury. The greatest part of his ministers were chiefly intent upon their own accommodation in their fortunes, in which they did not abound; or in their ease and pleasure which they passionately affected: having no further care of the public, than that no disturbance might break in upon them in their own days."-Echard, p. 447, 455. Masques were encouraged and highly relished by the king and court, at one of which the expence was not less, it is said, than 21,000 pounds.-Hist. Stu. p. 122.

At

"The custom of revels, wakes and other parish festivals, on Sundays, was at that time grown to a great enormity. Drunkenness, lewdness and riot were but the least part of it; fighting and blood generally accompanied. No county in England was then more debauched and disturbed by evels and clerks ales than that of Somerset. the earnest request of the gentlemen of that county (giving for reason, at the assizes, that many persons had been indicted for murdering bastards be gotten at revels, and for other grand disorders occasioned by these intemperate meetings) the judges, Richardson and Denham, with the con

sent of the whole bench, made an order, that these feasts should be suppressed on Sundays. But the chief justice, Richardson, being commanded to attend the council board, was severely reprimanded, and injoined (by the king) to revoke the order made at the assizes, as he would answer the contrary at his peril."-Ibid. p. 120. -Fuller, Book xI. p. 1147.-Rapin, Vol. x. p. 272.-Hist. Stu. p. 121.

"Many, notwithstanding the late king's procla mation, affecting still to forbid their servants to play, to go to ale-houses, or use any recreations on Sundays, king Charles renewed and confirmed the proclamation (of his blessed father) comMANDING, that the people should not be troubled or molested in their recreations: and declaring it his express will and pleasure that these FEASTS, WAKES, &c. shall be observed: and that all neighbourhood and freedom with man-like and lawful exercises be used: and the justices of peace are commanded not to molest any in their recreations: and the king further requires, that publication of this his COMMAND be made by order from the BISHOPS, through all the PARISH CHURCHES of their several dioceses respectively."-Neal, Vol. 11. p. 250. Many moderate men," says Dr. Fuller,

66

are

of opinion that this abuse of the Lord's Day was a principal procurer of God's anger since poured out upon this land, in a long and bloody civil war."-Fuller's Ch. Hist. p. 147.-" Instead of convincing the sober part of the nation, it struck them with a kind of horror, to see themselves invited by the authority of the king and church, to that which looked so like a contradiction to the command of GOD. It was certainly extremely out of character, for bishops and clergymen, who should be the supporters of religion, to draw men off from the practice of it in their families and

closets, by enticing them to public recreations. The court had their balls, masquerades, and plays on the Sunday evenings; while the youth of the country were at their revels, morrice dances, May games, church and clerk ales, and all kinds of recreations."-Neal, Vol. 11. p. 250..

"The severe pressing this declaration made sad havock among the puritan clergymen for seven years. Many strained their consciences to read it. Some, when they had read it, immediately read the fourth commandment to the people, Remember the Sabbath day to keep it holy; adding, This is the law of GOD; the other, the injunction of

man.

"In this king's reign also a severe order was published for the putting down all afternoon sermons, under pretence of complying with his Majesty's instructions of catechising by question and answer: and not only all other catechisms, except that in the common prayer, prohibited, but all expositions even of this catechism, which Bishop Wren declared as bad as a sermon. Dr. Pierce bishop of Bath and Wells so effectually suppressed the dangerous and ill practice of preaching twice a day, that he gave GOD thanks he had not one lecture left in all his diocese. The minister of Bridgwater was suspended by him for preaching on the Sunday evening, though a funeral sermon; and another called to an account for having two sermons in his church on the parish revel day; the bishop alleging, "It was an hindrance to the revel, and to the utterance of church ale.”—Bennet's Mem. p. 239.

The king was indeed zealous for episcopacy, and struggled hard to maintain it, and has therefore been represented as dying a martyr for it; but entirely without reason. "For Anno 1641, he solemnly passed an act in Scotland, which con